Calmore

History

The townland of Calmore is named after a large ancient hazel tree that was said to have been used in pagan ceremonies.

Calmore crannog

The townland of Calmore appears to have formerly been a place of some importance, attested by a crannog that once lay in an ancient lake in the townland. This crannog is stated as having been of a tolerable large size and constructed of an oak frame, composed of large logs and planks bound together by wooden pins. This frame was enclosed by long poles, standing upright and fastened by mortices. In April 1835, at the crannog, a flat bottomed boat of oak was discovered, containing several oak boards that served as seats. This boat appeared to have had no nail or iron work, being completely hallowed out from the trunk of a tree. In the 1780s a smaller boat of similar construction had also been found, but had been scuttled and sunk several times. It is stated that these boats may have been either pleasure or fishing boats belonging to Calmore Castle.

The crannog was dismantled in the early 19th century.

Calmore castle

Calmore Castle was an ancient castle that once stood in the townland of Calmore. It has been formerly known as O'Hagan's Castle and Rowley's Castle.

The O'Hagans of Ballinascreen when being questioned by John O'Donovan in 1821 as part of his letters pertaining to the antiquities of County Londonderry, claimed that Sir William O'Hagan built Calmore Castle. Local traditions however picked up by the Ordnance Survey Memoirs of 1836-37 state that it was his father, Shane More O'Hagan, who built it. Shane More O'Hagan is noted as being the proprietor of the Drapers Proportion in this area together with other tracts of land, including ten townlands in Ballynascreen and Lough Insholin [sic], the heart of a large territory of the same name.

The Ordnance Survey Memoirs note that in neighbouring Moneyshanere, a battle was said to have been fought between the O'Hagans who are stated as ruling Tobermore and the O'Neills of Tyrone, who are said to have come rampaging down from Ballynascreen. During its control by the O'Hagans, Calmore Castle was considered "once a place of very considerable strength, which commanded the mountain passes, and the fords of the Moyola".

After Sir William O'Hagan, Calmore Castle was inhabited by Owen Roe O'Hagan, who after which it is said to have been burned down. By 1619, a plantation house was built for William Rowley, which incorporated parts of Calmore Castle. Rowley was the brother of John Rowley, former chief agent of The Honourable The Irish Society, and later for the Drapers Company. Shortly after the 1641 rebellion, it fell back into Irish hands. In 1689, it was burnt by a party of Irish, who were part of the Irish army retreating from the Siege of Derry.

A tradition is recorded claiming that two years after it was burnt down, the very person who led the party and was the first to throw a sheaf of burning straw into the rooms, came begging to the windows of the partly repaired building. When he was recognised he was immediately "stalled" by Rowley himself. The last inhabitant of the estate was Henry Rowley in 1814, but was still listed as "Rowley's Castle" in Civil Survey maps from 1850. The Calmore Castle Plantation House no longer exists. The remains of the castle were carried off by a local tenant, John McKee, for building work.

Townland statistics

The town of Tobermore lies partially in this townland, and those of Moneyshanere, Moyesset, and Tobermore.