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C harlesfort House, once home to the referee of the famous 1947 New York All-Ireland Football Final, rose phoenix-like from the ashes of a fire that gutted it 30 years later, thanks to painstaking work by its current owner

The exterior of Charlesfort House, Ferns, Co Wexford

The standalone tub in one of the bathrooms

The centre courtyard has two guest lodges

Referee Martin O’Neill wearing all white to the right of the photo

Period features on the landing

The reception room with treble-bay windows and fireplace

The formal dining room at Charlesfort House

Custom-made units are a feature of the kitchen

An aerial view of Charlesfort

Charlesfort House, Ferns, Co Wexford Asking price: €1.25m (AMV) Agent: Kehoe and Associates (053) 9144 393

T he All-Ireland Football Final of 1947 is famous for two reasons. Hosted in New York, it was the only final ever to be staged outside Ireland. More unusual still, Cavan beat Kerry.

The New York final was intended to mark the centenary of the Great Famine and the waves of emigration that ensued to the US. And the score line on the day of 2-7 to 2-11 to Cavan was attributed by many pundits to that team’s shorter travel time, having opted for a 30-hour plane journey flying via the Azores. In contrast the Kerry team undertook a long journey by sea.

Tens of thousands of Irish Americans turned out to New York’s Polo Ground to cheer on their ancestral or chosen teams. Back home, all of Ireland tuned in on radio to Michael O’Hehir’s commentary. Overall the event was deemed to have been a great success (outside of Kerry).

Much of the planning was likely to have been undertaken at Charlesfort House near Ferns in Co Wexford, home of Martin O’Neill, the man who would be appointed to referee the historic game.

Referee Martin O’Neill wearing all white to the right of the photo

O’Neill was well got in GAA circles serving as secretary to the Leinster Council. During his tenure many meetings of the council were held at Charlesfort and, as a passionate Wexford supporter, he often hosted the great Rackard hurling brothers who would come for a chat and a ‘puck around‘ on the lawn.

But O’Neill’s house, a substantial 4,281 sq ft period residence dating from 1839 would later be gutted by fire in 1977 and for 30 years, it seemed like it was destined to remain a crumbling ruin, until along came Tom Murray in 2004.

Murray describes his decision to buy and rebuild Charlesfort as ‘accidental’. His bank manager and his friends referred to it as ‘the pile of stones’.

Running his own plant and civil engineering business, Murray was told about the house by a relation who worked for him. “He was always on to me about Charlesfort. I eventually went up to see it and, I’ll have to say, it didn’t appeal to me, from the road anyway. When I walked up the back lane to the property I saw a site for sale opposite the back gate and I actually went to look at that.”

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The formal dining room at Charlesfort House

But his colleague convinced him to go back and to see Charlesfort. This time, he went in and walked around. The place was in a state of near total dereliction, “There was no roof, no windows no floors, trees were growing up through the ground in the kitchen and the dining room and there was about four foot of rubble in the basement,” Tom says, “but I have to say, the structure was fantastic, absolutely powerful.

“I didn’t know if I’d be able for that kind of a house,” he says, “but it was on my mind, and I began to think you could make a very fine property out of it. It was a well-known house, a GAA house and all that. So between the jigs and the reels myself and my wife Mary said we would make a go of it.”

Once a deal was done Tom sought out his bank manager who agreed to back it. But just as he started work, the banker phoned a mutual friend to know how it was all going. When he heard the project was under way he obviously began to feel a chill under his feet.

As it happened, Tom was in the car with his friend when the banker called. Tom remembers thinking he wouldn’t mention the house to him again until he was “sitting at the kitchen table at Charlesfort”. So Tom avoided raising the subject with his banker friend.

“One day he rang me to know if he could meet me. When he asked me where, I told him ‘Come up to the house’.” When the banker asked him what house, Tom told him to head for Charlesfort.

He arrived as arranged and, according to Tom, went a whiter shade of pale when he saw the finished product.

From the time of purchase in 2004 it took about two and a half years to complete the work at Charlesfort. Although it wasn’t listed, Tom and Mary remained true to the provenance of the house. The planning permission stipulated certain conditions including the installation of wooden sash windows, the maintenance of door sizes and the like. “We used lime mortar in the walls, which is traditional and acts as insulation as well,” Tom says.

Period features on the landing

Structurally, the basement and the ground floor follow the original layout, aside from the kitchen which was moved from the basement to the ground floor. Upstairs however, it has been changed radically.

Mary took charge of the interior décor and the gardens depending on her own instincts without reference to old photographs or the like. “I did all the donkey work and Mary did all the tasty work,” Tom says.

“The drains under the house didn’t need to be touched,” Tom explains, “ceramic pipes were used and when we put a camera down we could see they were all as clean as a whistle. They dug the drains and built a wall with stones at each side of the pipe right up to the ground level, fantastic work.”

An aerial view of Charlesfort

Charlesfort House is a double bow- fronted country house located 5km from the village of Ferns. The entire consists of the main house, two guest lodges, 5.5ac of land, extensive gardens, a large workshop with additional dual-sided loft space.

The two-storey over basement of 4,821 sq ft includes an entrance hall, a large reception/living room, a dining room, four bedrooms, four bathrooms, a kitchen/dining room, butler’s pantry, library/home office, laundry room, wine cellar, courtyard basement and storage rooms.

Cut-granite steps between wrought- iron railings lead to a front doorway framed by Doric columns on plinths. The hallway is a large space with marble- tiled flooring and a marble-cut mosaic feature framed with four arch rests.

The reception room with treble-bay windows and fireplace

The reception/living room has treble-bay windows, a marble open fireplace, wide-panel, solid oak floors and a dual-aspect window in a curved wall facing the rear courtyard. The kitchen is centred around a reconditioned vintage AGA and is fitted with custom-made units in locally sourced solid oak, solid elm timber and a granite work top. The butler’s pantry is finished with pippy oak units and a granite worktop. A door from the pantry leads to the rear courtyard.

Custom-made units are a feature of the kitchen

At the garden basement level is the formal dining room with natural stone flooring and dual-aspect windows. A solid-fuel stove is surrounded by a masonry brick wall with red brick cornices and two feature arches.

Two bedrooms are located at this level which also includes a large walk-in closet, a bathroom, a laundry room and a wine cellar. The winding stairs from the main hallway leads to a landing overlooking the rear courtyard. On the left is a space known as the library nook. Lit by three sash windows it could also be used as a home office while, to the right, is the guest bathroom.

The standalone tub in one of the bathrooms

On the first floor proper is the master bedroom suite with treble-bay windows, a cast-iron fireplace and a large walk-in wardrobe. The bathroom has a standalone cast-iron bathtub set beside the window.

Across the hall is another bedroom with curved walls and two sash windows overlooking the countryside. The house has cast-iron radiators, splayed wall architraves and skirtings, brass door handles, ornate cut door protectors and key draft sliders.

The centre courtyard has two guest lodges

The centre courtyard, accessed through large arch gates, has two 1,200 sq ft guest lodges with separate road access from the rear of the property. Each has two bedrooms, a bathroom and a kitchen/living/dining space.

Staying in the courtyard, the corner unit includes an office, an entertainment room with a bar counter, a pool table and bathroom. “The place is too big for the two of us now,” says Tom who is delighted with the way Charlesfort turned out, as are all the neighbours. He hasn’t been daunted by the experience.

“I wouldn’t mind doing the same thing again.”

The Murrays’ work means a historical Wexford building is ready to be lived in by a new generation.

Kehoe and Associates is guiding the sale of Charlesfort House at €1.25m.

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