{"id":311236,"date":"2026-02-22T09:35:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T09:35:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/311236\/"},"modified":"2026-02-22T09:35:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-22T09:35:12","slug":"a-divided-estate-a-nightclub-a-hippie-colony-and-now-a-thriving-hotel-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/311236\/","title":{"rendered":"A divided estate, a nightclub, a \u2018hippie colony\u2019 and now a thriving hotel \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Walking around Castle Leslie estate \u2013 which has borne her family name for more than 400 years \u2013 as the light ebbs in early February, Sammy Leslie urges me to feel \u201cthe magic\u201d while she talks about the drumlin lands of Monaghan<\/a>, Tyrone<\/a> and Armagh<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Magic is a word used often by Leslie, who has brought the much-divided estate back together after nearly 40 years of hard work, and placed into a trust for future generations to enjoy. <\/p>\n

It is a reunification story, but not as one would normally understand it.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Vikings came through here, St Patrick built a church here. It\u2019s an incredibly special place, not just in its own right, but because of where it sits on the border and in \u2018old Ulster\u2019, as such,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re in the heart of the kingdom of Oriel, in that magical ancient kingdom. It\u2019s a little bit twilight; it\u2019s neither here nor there. It\u2019s slightly ethereal, and that\u2019s what I love about it.\u201d <\/p>\n

On her return to Monaghan in her early 20s, Leslie was confronted by a castle with pools of water in the basement, a leaking roof and a much-reduced estate following divisions prompted by wills or the lack of cash. The lodge, a separate building on the estate grounds, had also been sold.<\/p>\n

Before she returned, she had telephoned home from England to tell her father that she had become the youngest-ever holder of credentials enabling her to train top-level riding instructors. Only then did she find out that the estate\u2019s equestrian centre had been sold too. <\/p>\n

\u201cOkay, I\u2019ll buy it back someday,\u201d she remembers thinking. And she has. Today, the equestrian centre is a key part of Castle Leslie\u2019s pitch to international visitors, who come for a week of training, or cross-country riding.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey can\u2019t get the latter elsewhere. People come from Australia for a week, just for the riding. It\u2019s bucket-list trip for many. Our horses are great. They think. They have the fifth leg, you know. They\u2019re very smart. They get themselves out of trouble.<\/p>\n

\"CastleCastle Leslie: ‘This is the best example of a historic estate with an estate village, where the estate is still part and parcel of the community.’ Photograph: Alan Betson <\/p>\n

With feeling, she talks of the efforts made to rid the castle of dry rot. It is a subject on which she could talk for hours. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s highly efficient; it\u2019s ridiculously intelligent,\u201d she declares of the wood-devouring fungus. \u201cIt can track across metal beams to get to fresh timber. It\u2019ll keep eating away, and it won\u2019t come out until it\u2019s hungry, until it starts to stress, and then the \u2018flower\u2019 will pop out, and it\u2019ll shoot its spores off. We stripped everything, we sprayed everything.\u201d <\/p>\n

The friendships made during her dry-rot years have endured: \u201cSeamus McElroy was my first builder, who helped me put the roof skylight back on the billiard room. When it blew off in [a] storm, everybody wanted thousands of pounds to fix it.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2019Ah, no,\u2019 he said, \u2018we can make a timber version, put felt on it, get it up on the roof. Cost about \u00a3300.\u2019 Worked with him ever since, and built a great team up. Mc-El-roy,\u201d she says, spelling his name phonetically, and adding, with a fond laugh: \u201cThe son of the king.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the following years, Leslie brought six of the castle\u2019s rooms back to life and started doing dinners in the diningroom, where the meals were served by herself and a colleague, Belfast-born Jackie Gormley. In time, more rooms were restored.<\/p>\n

Drawing on the lessons offered by King Charles from his model village of Poundbury, in Dorset, southern England, Leslie put aside lands in the early 2000s adjacent to the village of Glaslough, where Castle Leslie is located, and built homes, a third of which were offered to locals a fortnight before anyone else.<\/p>\n

\"CastleCastle Leslie: The divided estate is back together after four decades of work spearheaded by Sammy Leslie. Photograph: Alan Betson \"EverythingEverything about Castle Leslie contradicts simple narratives of Irish history. Photograph: Alan Betson \"CastleCastle Leslie: ‘It’s a bucket-list trip for many.’ Photograph: Alan Betson <\/p>\n

She wanted locals to buy the properties, she says, adding that most of the original estate houses were sold to staff and villagers in the 1960s. \u201cOne man then bought a house for his mum and it cost him two months\u2019 wages from driving buses in Birmingham.\u201d<\/p>\n

The decades since have brought challenges and successes: the lodge \u2013 The Lodge at Castle Leslie, a four-star hotel \u2013 now has 50 bedrooms, while the castle itself has been entirely restored, to beyond its earlier glories.<\/p>\n

Speaking in the lodge over early-morning coffee, Leslie says: \u201cThis is the best example of a historic estate with an estate village, where the estate is still part and parcel of the community.\u201d<\/p>\n

Today, the estate has 270 staff, many of whom have worked there for decades, including Gormley, who left east Belfast in 1987 to come to Castle Leslie: \u201cBelfast was never the place for me. I loved [Castle Leslie] from the minute I came down here,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Hotel general manager Kevin Kenny, came 17 years ago \u201cand forgot to leave\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cAm I a lifer here? Ah, I don\u2019t know, but there\u2019s always been a reason to stay. Every year, we have grown,\u201d says Kenny, who works closely with the estate\u2019s chief executive officer, Brian Baldwin.<\/p>\n

\"JackieJackie Gormley, estate and equestrian manager. Photograph: Alan Betson \"GeneralGeneral manager Kevin Kenny: ‘Am I a lifer here?’ Photograph: Alan Betson \"AaronAaron Duffy, executive chef at Castle Leslie estate. Photograph: Alan Betson <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I started here, we had 120, 130 people working here, at a push, and a lot of them part-time. We\u2019re at 271 this morning. About 140 of them are full-time, most of them living in the local community, or nearby,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Executive chef Aaron Duffy, who lives in Beragh, Co Tyrone, is equally enthusiastic about his eight years at Castle Leslie: \u201cEverything\u2019s reinvested back into the business. It\u2019s owned by the trust, so that\u2019s really exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n

The culture sets the atmosphere of the place, he says. \u201cKitchens are notorious for people coming and going. That\u2019s just the nature of it, but I can count on one hand how many people I\u2019ve lost in my eight years here.\u201d<\/p>\n

For decades, Leslie\u2019s mission has been sustainability. Illustrating her vision to The Irish Times, she shows \u201cmy poo farm\u201d \u2013 where seven hectares of carefully created wetlands can deal with the waste of 2,000 people. Guests walk through the ponds daily as they ramble about the estate. <\/p>\n

\u201cAfterwards, I ask them what they thought of our sewage works? And they\u2019re like, \u2018Really?\u201d Nature\u2019s answer to nature\u2019s problem, that is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leslie\u2019s intention is that Castle Leslie will come to be seen as a beacon for sustainability and community. <\/p>\n

It was a very divisive, unfair society. And if it hadn\u2019t been Caledon, it would have been something else<\/p>\n

\u2014 \u00a0Sammy Leslie<\/p>\n

\u201cTourism isn\u2019t just about the old model of bed numbers, footfall, staff and turnover. It is about how it all actually works with living, breathing, working communities. That\u2019s where you get things that are really interesting and authentic, to create a space that everybody falls in love with. That\u2019s our benchmark,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Everything about Castle Leslie contradicts simple narratives of Irish history. The estate was created by John \u201cFighting Bishop\u201d Leslie, who fought and defeated Cromwell\u2019s soldiers at Raphoe, Co Donegal, before going on to relieve Derry in 1649.<\/p>\n

In his prayer before battle, the bishop he beseeched \u201cthe God of love\u201d to keep out of Ireland\u2019s religious wars and let soldiers decide the outcome: \u201cO God of battles, Lord most high. Be not our judge, not even theirs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following the Restoration in 1660, King Charles II wanted John Leslie to become archbishop of Ireland, and lord lieutenant. Pleading old age, Leslie declined and was awarded \u00a32,000 and the bishopric of Clogher instead.<\/p>\n

With the money, he bought lands in Monaghan and Donegal. Despite his age, he married Catherine, who was 52 years younger than him. They had 10 children.<\/p>\n

One ancestor opposed the Act of Union, rejecting bribes of cash and titles. Others supported tenants during the Famine, an act remembered 60 years later when local villagers prevented the anti-Treaty IRA from torching the castle.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe diningroom in Castle Leslie, Glaslough, Co Monaghan. Photograph: Alan Betson \"TheThe ‘Churchill piano’ needs a bit of TLC. Photograph: Alan Betson \"CastleCastle Leslie is in the village of Glaslough, close to the Border. Photograph: Alan Betson <\/p>\n

Some of the family split over their attitudes to Home Rule, with Colonel John Leslie disinheriting his son, Shane, and barring Winston Churchill \u2013 a cousin on the American line of the family \u2013 from visiting the estate over the issue.<\/p>\n

Today, a piano once played by Churchill stands in one of the castle\u2019s rooms, overlooking the lake: \u201cBlenheim [the Churchills\u2019 ancestral home] would have had plenty of pianos. So, the poor Irish relatives got the pianos. Only fair. It needs a bit of TLC,\u201d says Leslie.<\/p>\n

The story of so much of Irish history of the last century and more can be felt everywhere on the Leslie estate, never more so at a junction of tracks, where Armagh, Tyrone and Monaghan meet.<\/p>\n

Every Border townland, village or town for miles about was affected by the Troubles, north or south of the line. Glaslough was no different. The vast majority minded their words, looked after their neighbours and hoped for better days.<\/p>\n

For Leslie, it meant an end to schooling in Donoghmore, north of Dungannon, after threats were made to the family during the 1981 hunger strikes meaning that \u201cit wasn\u2019t safe for us to go across the Border every day\u201d.<\/p>\n

In the gloom, Tynan can be seen a few miles away on a hill, where, in that same year, 86-year-old Norman Stronge and his son James were killed by the Provisional IRA and the 250-year-old house torched.<\/p>\n

The IRA gang, which it is believed included Jim Lynagh, who was later killed by the SAS at Loughgall, Co Armagh, had prepared a number of escape routes from Tynan, including tracks across Castle Leslie, it is believed.<\/p>\n

Padlocks on wall gates were found broken shortly afterwards. \u201cWe never talked about it, other than [to say] how shocking it was. Nobody discussed it; you never discussed anything outside the house,\u201d says Leslie.<\/p>\n

\u201cParents tried to keep children innocent. That would have been common practice for every house. Most people tried to normalise things, tried to keep life as normal as possible in circumstances that are as bad as possible.\u201d <\/p>\n

A few kilometres to the northeast of Castle Leslie lies the Co Tyrone village of Caledon, where the spark of the civil rights movement was lit in 1968 when a Catholic family were evicted from a house where they had been squatting, and a 19-year-old Protestant girl allocated an empty house next door days later.<\/p>\n

Caledon scuppered plans to turn the estate into a luxury hotel and golf course: \u201cEverything stopped. The backers said: \u2018We\u2019ll just take three months and wait and see what happens.\u2019 As we know, it was 30 years later before it settled,\u201d says Leslie.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a very divisive, unfair society. And if it hadn\u2019t been Caledon, it would have been something else,\u201d Leslie tells The Irish Times, as she drives around the locality along roads and across bridges that were closed for decades because of The Troubles.<\/p>\n

The hotel plan was just one of many ideas that had been thought of to keep the estate going in times when many others crumbled, including a nightclub in the 1970s that fell foul of the local bishop.<\/p>\n

The nightclub in the lodge \u2013 \u201cAnnabelle\u2019s On The Bog\u201d \u2013 had been the brainchild of Leslie\u2019s father, Desmond, who had been handed responsibility for the estate by his older brother, Jack.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen, the bishop closed it down. I think he denounced it from the pulpit, and basically said anybody that went would be damned. After that, it became a hippie colony for a few years.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Walking around Castle Leslie estate \u2013 which has borne her family name for more than 400 years \u2013…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":311237,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[48512,9686,42,3773,43,2443,40,38,41,39,19828,976],"class_list":{"0":"post-311236","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-armagh","9":"tag-common-ground","10":"tag-headlines","11":"tag-monaghan","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-northern-ireland","14":"tag-top-news","15":"tag-top-stories","16":"tag-topnews","17":"tag-topstories","18":"tag-tyrone","19":"tag-weekendreview"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/311236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=311236"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/311236\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/311237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=311236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=311236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=311236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}