The Clones Estate

THE BARONS DACRE WERE MAJOR LANDOWNERS IN COUNTY MONAGHAN, WITH 7,920 ACRES 

The family of BARRETT-LENNARD originated in Essex.

The name was an amalgam of the Barrett and Lennard families, after Richard Barrett took the name LENNARD in consideration of the manor of Bell House (Belhus) in Essex, bequeathed to him by Edward, 1st Baron Barrett of Newburgh.

The surname was styled LENNARD-BARRETT until 1755, when Thomas, 17th Lord Dacre, transposed the order of the names.

The Barrett-Lennards were absentee landlords of the Clones Estate, which originated in confiscated church lands.

Prominent members of the family included Thomas Lennard, 1st Earl of Sussex, who, in 1674, married the thirteen-year-old Lady Anne FitzRoy (alias Palmer, the family name of the Earl of Castlemaine), natural daughter of CHARLES II and Lady Castlemaine, afterwards Duchess of Cleveland.

The King and her mother spent the first night of the Restoration together and she was born nine months later.

His Majesty acknowledged her as his child and granted her the royal arms with the baton sinister.

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ANNE, 16th Baroness Dacre (1684-1755), younger daughter of the 1st Earl of Sussex, married thrice.

By her first husband, Richard Lennard, who later assumed the surname BARRETT under the will of Sir Edward Barrett, she had an only son,

THOMAS, 17th Baron (1717-86), who took a great interest in the management of his estates, manifested by the very considerable number of letters which remain from both his Norfolk and his Irish agents, giving him full accounts of all the details of their management.

In 1740, Lord Dacre paid a visit to Ireland for the purpose of looking after his property.

Merely 23 years of age, and recently married, he was greatly interested in his intended visit, and anxious to show his new bride his town of Clones and the considerable estates which he owned surrounding it.

His lordship's agent, Todd, said that it contained

"only one parlour and three bedrooms with fireplaces, and three other little rooms without fireplaces or any furniture. In the cellar a hogshead of old French claret, very good, if not spoiled with this long frost."

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THE CASTLE, Clones, County Monaghan, was re-discovered in 2016.

The Barrett-Lennard Papers are held at PRONI.

First published in January, 2013.