Princess Diana’s cousin’s €8.5m Enniskillen castle comes with 17 homes, four private islands, a colourful history and its own resident ghost

Asking price: €8.5m

Agent: Savills (01) 663 4357 and +44 (0)28 9026 7824

For the price of one grand Victorian pile in Dalkey, you can now have 18 homes on 448 acres with 6.5 miles of waterfront and four private islands. And one of those 18 homes is a historic stately castle that can fit in the equivalent floor space of 15 average Irish family homes.

But you’ll have to move north of the border for the pleasure. Belle Isle, one of Ireland’s swishiest castle estates, has been brought back to market for €8.5m after its agreed sale recently fell through.

Located outside Enniskillen, the stately home and grounds are owned by James Hamilton, the Duke of Abercorn. He bought it in 1991 with his oldest son Lord Nicholas Hamilton in mind.

In recent decades, it has become one of Northern Ireland’s most popular upmarket country house hotels. Belle Isle has had a succession of colourful owners going back to the 1600s from earls and Celtic chiefs to a “famously cantankerous eccentric”, who had his wife’s lover horse-whipped and sparked a notorious 19th century scandal in the process.

And of course, the castle is reputed to have its own resident ghost. It had been placed on the market by the Duke early last year and a sale had been agreed by year’s end.

Located on the northern tip of island-dotted Upper Lough Erne, Belle Isle Castle dates to the 17th century, but the 200-acre island where it stands was formerly the Ballymacmanus stronghold where scholar Cathal Óg Mac Maghnusa compiled the famous Annals Of Ulster, outlining the history of Celtic Ireland from St Patrick up to the late 15th century.

The following century, Cathal’s clan, along with the O’Neills and O’Donnells, rebelled and forfeited their lands as a result.

Ballymacmanus was acquired by the soldier-of-fortune Paul Gore, ancestor of Countess Markievicz and the Sligo Gore-Booths. But Belle Isle’s most colourful past resident is, without a doubt, John Grey Vesey Porter, who was described in a sympathetic local newspaper as “onward, forward... fidgety, maggoty, yet blunt and fearless”.

Porter was involved in railways, newspapers and steamships. In 1863, at 47, he married 18-year-old Elizabeth Jane Hall, the co-heiress of Inishmore Hall, an estate touching Belle Isle.

Seven years into her childless marriage to the ageing and cantankerous Porter, Elizabeth sought solace with Captain Leonard Poynter of the 16th Regiment, stationed in nearby Enniskillen.

The Clogher Record reports: “Porter found out about the affair and, with the aid of his butler and other men-servants, lured Captain Poynter to Belleisle, where he was considerably knocked about, and had his hair and one side of his luxuriant moustache cut off, and was then severely horse-whipped by Porter personally.

“Captain Poynter sought £10,000 damages against Porter (who) would well have been well advised to have settled out of court. Instead, a packed Dublin courtroom was regaled for almost a week with salacious details of the doings of Mrs Porter and Captain Poynter at Belleisle.”

Poynter got damages of one farthing for his pains. Porter divorced Ellie and she fled to London, along with her parents, where she died in her early 40s.

Though politically ambitious, Porter managed to offend everyone. He launched “blistering attacks” on the locally powerful Orange Order and criticised Catholic priests for “not teaching a reasonable religion”, records the Dictionary of Irish Biography. The 1901 Census finally finds him living at ‘Belleisle’ with his sister Emily and four servants, unable to read or write due to “blindness”. He died a year later.

As with Captain Poynter, Porter left his mark at Belle Isle. The house had previously fallen into ruin. “He restyled the house in a free manorial style, for which he engaged the architect Morley Hurder; the result was grand enough in places, but incoherent,” records the DIB.

A travel book from 1871 states that the castle has “the finest view which can be obtained… of the upper lake and its numerous isles”. The same book declares it is haunted by the ghost of a Lord Rosse.

The estate stayed in the Porter family until 1991, when it was acquired by James Hamilton, a cousin to Princess Diana. He developed it as country house accommodation with a capacity for up to 95 guests. The estate spans 448 acres, including the castle, a walled garden, 17 cottages and apartments, and four private islands.

In the main house, there is a library, four-poster beds, vaulted ceilings, lots of armour and antlers, standalone Victorian baths, an enormous dining room overlooked by a balustraded balcony, and of course, the aforementioned ghost. Including a basement and mezzanine area over the dining hall, there’s 17,874 sq ft in the castle with 16 bedrooms, 12 of which are double, three twin and a single and most located on the second floor.

The ground floor houses the library, large pantry, utility room, three kitchen areas and two drawing rooms. It’s a popular venue for weddings, corporate events and getaways.

The whole castle, sleeping 31 people, can be had from £3,000 (€3,500) nightly (weekly rate on enquiry), including breakfast.

The slightly grander Hamilton wing, featuring a massive dining room literally ‘fit for a lord’, sleeps 17, and is available for £1,650 (€1,922) a night.

The Abercorn Wing sleeps up to 10 people, with five double bedrooms and a huge kitchen/dining area with a marble-topped island.

Another 58 guests can be accommodated elsewhere on the estate in two lakeside cottages, two stone coach houses and a courtyard of eight apartments converted from stables, with most original features still intact.

It could be continued as a business or once again become a private home of distinction. With eight lakes in the area, there’s plenty to do, including fishing, golfing, shooting, archery, falconry, kayaking/canoeing, clay pigeon shooting and even ‘murder mystery’ role play. Horse-whipping, however, is no longer on the menu. Savills seeks €8.5m.