Frescati House - The End

The End

At this stage, it was clear that the attempt to preserve Frescati was being lost. In 1982, the Corporation tried to get an injunction in the High Court to compel Roches Stores to restore the remainder of the house as per the planning conditions. The judge, Mr. Justice O’Hanlon criticised both sides for the situation that had been allowed to develop. The Corporation had failed both to ensure that the vacant building was kept in proper repair and to enforce the law on Roches Stores. They hadn’t taken effective action over the developers’ refusal to abide by undertakings they had given to retain the one house and to spend £20,000 on essential repairs. Mr. Justice O’Hanlon concluded that the situation had gone beyond the point of no return, and that it was not feasible at this stage to restore Frescati. Here is a quote from the final judgement:

It appears to me that the developers have been completely indifferent to, or perhaps have even welcomed, this deterioration in the condition of the building, and have done virtually nothing to halt it. I feel the developers have shown a complete disregard for the moral obligations which arose from their course of dealing with the corporation or the planning applications; but I feel the corporation have also been extremely remiss to exercising whatever statutory powers were open to them to cope with the situation.

On the 4 November 1983, in the early hours of the morning the shell of Frescati was razed to the ground, thus ending a campaign which had lasted almost thirteen years. Two JCBs completed the job quietly, and not a single protester turned up to hamper the demolition, though some came to observe the demolition. Some of the bamboo, which was planted in 1784 by Lord Edward from shoots he brought back from St. Lucia in the Caribbean, was still there. Souvenir hunters came to scour the rubble, which was left in situ until ten o’clock in the morning. Then the remains were collected into lorries and dumped in Ringsend. Frescati’s end was summarised in a letter by Aidan Kelly, which appeared in the Irish Independent:

Softly, well before the winter dawn, the yellow monster lurched towards the gray façade. A lone rook stirred in the tall beeches nearby, troubled by the relentless purring of powerful motors. Down beyond the stream, what remains of his ornamental garden, a few regal bamboo blades, trembled in the night breeze. A mighty arm nudged the building. There was no crash, not even a rumble. Masonry fell with a rustle and hiss of dust down ivy-clad walls, to thud in moss. Within the hour, Frescati was no more. A long time later, in the dull light of the November morning, early shoppers passed along, wrapped in the world of their own concerns. They noticed nothing. Maybe our small and selfish minds, our furtive Irish ways, our ready response to the turning of a coin, could never grasp the natural nobility and great sincerity of the man ! His progressive recognition of the total injustice of the behaviour of the aristocracy towards Ireland, is something the Irish have never had the greatness of mind to value. In the Irish mind this gallant man has always been a lesser patriot. Now they would roll a boulder in, and slap a plaque upon it! How quickly we can add an insult to an injury, and know not that we do it