Woodlawn (; historically known as Mota or Moote) is a settled area in

County Galway County Galway ( ; ) is a Counties of Ireland, county in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. It is in the Northern and Western Region, taking up the south of the Provinces of Ireland, province of Connacht. The county population was 276,451 at the 20 ...

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

Location

Woodlawn lies on the R359 regional road, between the main road and rail networks which traverse the area east-west, west of Kilconnell, from

Ballinasloe Ballinasloe ( ; ) is a town in the easternmost part of County Galway, Ireland. Located at an ancient crossing point on the River Suck, evidence of ancient settlement in the area includes a number of Bronze Age sites. Built around a 12th-centur ...

and approximately from the city of

Galway Galway ( ; , ) is a City status in Ireland, city in (and the county town of) County Galway. It lies on the River Corrib between Lough Corrib and Galway Bay. It is the most populous settlement in the province of Connacht, the List of settleme ...

. Woodlawn House and its demesne are in the townlands of Woodlawn and Killaan, while the broader area also features Woodlawn railway station, a post office and a Church of Ireland parish church.

Transport

Woodlawn railway station was built by the second Lord Ashtown, and opened on 1 August 1858. It was closed for goods traffic on 2 June 1978. It is on the main

Iarnród Éireann Iarnród Éireann, () or Irish Rail, is the operator of the national Rail transport in Ireland, railway network of Ireland. Established on 2 February 1987, it is a subsidiary of CIÉ, Córas Iompair Éireann (CIÉ). It operates all internal I ...

Intercity line from

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

to Galway, situated between Ballinasloe and Attymon halt stations, and still open for some passenger business.

Features

Woodlawn House

Woodlawn House, about north-west of

, is the former seat of the

Trench A trench is a type of digging, excavation or depression in the ground that is generally deeper than it is wide (as opposed to a swale (landform), swale or a bar ditch), and narrow compared with its length (as opposed to a simple hole or trapping ...

family, holders of the title Baron (Lord) Ashtown. This large

Italianate The Italianate style was a distinct 19th-century phase in the history of Classical architecture. Like Palladianism and Neoclassicism, the Italianate style combined its inspiration from the models and architectural vocabulary of 16th-century It ...

building A building or edifice is an enclosed Structure#Load-bearing, structure with a roof, walls and window, windows, usually standing permanently in one place, such as a house or factory. Buildings come in a variety of sizes, shapes, and functions, a ...

was built in the late 18th century by Frederic Trench, 1st Baron Ashtown, of Moate, and extended and remodelled in the mid-19th century, following the marriage of his nephew,

Frederic Mason Trench, 2nd Baron Ashtown Frederick Mason Trench, 2nd Baron Ashtown Deputy Lieutenant, DL (25 December 1804 – 12 September 1880) was an Irish peer and magistrate. Early life He was son of Francis Trench and his wife Mary Mason, second daughter of Henry Mason, and ...

, to his second wife, Elizabeth Oliver Gascoigne of Castle Oliver, Limerick. The house was vacated and the furnishings sold when the third Lord Ashtown became bankrupt in the 1920s, and eventually it was sold by the fourth Lord Ashtown to a cousin, Derek Le Poer Trench, in 1947. In 1973, it was sold on to a local farmer, and it changed hands further thereafter, being held by a local publican from 1989 to 2001, and then sold on with its remaining 115 acres of land. As of 2019, and unoccupied for over 40 years, it had suffered fire damage in 1982, and been partly repaired with an emergency Heritage Council grant. It has 35,000 sq ft of space, and more than fifty rooms, with the central part comprising three storeys over a basement, and two two-storey wings. The estate also includes a family

mausoleum A mausoleum is an external free-standing building constructed as a monument enclosing the burial chamber of a deceased person or people. A mausoleum without the person's remains is called a cenotaph. A mausoleum may be considered a type o ...

, a walled garden, an orchard, stables, two staff houses and some cottages. There is also a lake.

Religion

There is a

Church of Ireland The Church of Ireland (, ; , ) is a Christian church in Ireland, and an autonomy, autonomous province of the Anglican Communion. It is organised on an all-Ireland basis and is the Christianity in Ireland, second-largest Christian church on the ...

church, within the parish group of Aughrim, in the ancient Diocese of Clonfert, now within the United

Diocese of Limerick and Killaloe The Diocese of Limerick and Killaloe (formally: 'The United Dioceses of Limerick, Ardfert, Aghadoe, Killaloe, Kilfenora, Clonfert, Kilmacduagh and Emly') was a former diocese of the Church of Ireland that was located in mid-western Irelan ...

. It was designed in 1860 and built in 1874 for Lord Ashtown, by James Forth Kempster. It has a four-bay nave, a vestry and bell tower, carved wooden pulpit and lectern, and stained glass windows.

References