placenamesBallynagore
Béal Átha na nGabhar
The Brosna powered Ballynagore’s mills, while two surviving houses record the families who owned the businesses.
The name
These Irish name elements are associated with this record in the Logainm glossary.
An element’s translation is a clue, rather than a complete explanation of the name. Its form and meaning depend on local history and the full Irish name.
Recorded forms
- Béal Átha na nGabhar · Irish · main form · validated name
- Ballynagore · English · main form
- Ballinagore · English · main form · local name
Place & story
An industrial village on the Brosna
In 1837 Samuel Lewis recorded thirty-five houses and 182 inhabitants at Ballinagore, one of the village’s alternative spellings. A four-arched bridge crossed the Brosna. Beside the river were a bleach-green and fulling mill owned by W. H. Mulock, as well as flour mills employing seventy men. Lewis described the flour mills as capable of grinding forty thousand barrels of wheat a year. The figures capture a working industrial settlement rather than simply a stopping place on the Kilbeggan–Mullingar road. [2]
John Perry’s house
The Perry family bought the Mulocks’ milling interests in 1838. John Perry later commissioned Ballynagore House from the architect John Skipton Mulvany, with construction dated to about 1852 by the NIAH. Its irregular outline, projecting gables and wide bracketed eaves contrast with the formality of its limestone Doric entrance porch. The house connects the village’s milling economy with an ambitious domestic commission by one of the leading Irish architects of the period. [3]
Glen Brosna and William Perry
Glen Brosna House, formerly called Handley Cross, stands beside the river at the western side of Ballynagore. Originally a Mulock home, it became the residence of John Perry’s brother William after the milling sale. The NIAH describes a villa of about 1830, altered around 1850, with a projecting porch, decorative ironwork and a distinctive round-headed triple window. William sold it in 1856. Its later alterations may also involve Mulvany, but that attribution remains tentative. [4]
Geographic information
- Place type
- Population centre
- County
- Westmeath
- Barony
- Moycashel
- Civil parish
- Castletownkindalen
- Within
- Ballynagore
- Coordinates
- 53.40898, -7.47364 (approximate)
- Logainm ID
- 1413758 ↗
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Ballynagore. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Ballinagore, A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland1837 · Samuel Lewis, hosted by GBHistoricalGIS / UniversityofPortsmouth
- Ballynagore House, NIAH15319011 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
- Glen Brosna House, NIAH15319004 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2025-01-10. How this page was prepared.