Though the map labels it ‘Drumboe Castle’, the typeface used suggests the building wasn’t considered a genuine antiquity at that time. Lewis’s Topographical Dictionary from 1837 describes it as the residence of Sir E. Hayes, Bart., M.P., set on an attractive lawn within an improved demesne. The building didn’t make it into the 1983 Donegal Survey, as there wasn’t enough evidence beyond its name to prove it existed before 1700, which was the survey’s cut-off date for inclusion.

The castle gained a darker significance in Irish history during the Civil War. On 14 March 1923, four anti-Treaty IRA members who had been captured the previous November were executed by firing squad at Drumboe and buried on the grounds. Their bodies remained there for over a year before being secretly exhumed and moved to Athlone Military Barracks in late summer 1924. The executions shocked the nation and became immortalised in the ballad ‘The Drumboe Martyrs’, ensuring the castle’s name would be forever linked with this tragic chapter of Ireland’s struggle for independence.

Today, while the original 17th-century house may have uncertain origins, Drumboe’s place in Irish memory is firmly established; not as the grand residence of a baronet, but as the site where four young men met their deaths in the bitter aftermath of the War of Independence.