Sir, – Further to recent letters on the future of Aldborough House in Dublin, your readers might be interested in the fate of Belcamp House, an important 18th-century structure within a few miles of Dublin Airport.
This house, designed by James Hoban (the architect of the White House) in the 1770s and containing an original oval office, a precursor to its famous namesake, was for a time the residence of Henry Grattan, as well as being rented for a time by Countess Markievicz as a centre for the Fianna movement. Run as a school by the Oblate Fathers as Belcamp College, which closed in 2004, the house and lands were sold to Gannon Homes and, like so many other development sites, ended up in Nama.
The house has been allowed to fall into complete neglect and, through vandalism and various arson attacks, little is left now but a ruin of a house that welcomed Jonathan Swift and other famous personages when it was one of the leading country houses in the Dublin area.
Even if funds were not available to preserve this historic building, surely it would not have cost much to protect it from the vandalism directed against it. Sadly Aldborough House seems to be going the same way. – Yours, etc,
ERNEST CROSSEN,
Ard Aoibhinn,
Chapelizod,
Dublin 20.