Swift's House, Loughry House grounds, Cookstown, Co Tyrone, BT80 8AD

Swift's House, Loughry House grounds, Cookstown

This is a detached single-room summer house built around 1830, located on the periphery of the Loughry College estate, formerly the country estate of the Lindesay family. The building is currently unused.

The summer house is square in plan with a pyramidal pavilion roof. The external walls are painted render, and the roof is slate with lead ridges and a carved stone ball finial at the apex. Rainwater goods are cast iron. A stone chimney is positioned at the southwest corner. The front north elevation features a single square-headed doorway with plain moulded edges, fitted with a timber tongue and groove door containing a rectangular vision panel. The east side elevation has no openings, only a rainwater downpipe. The ground falls sharply to the south and west, creating substantial under-building on these sides.

The cottage is set on a steep bank overlooking the Killymoon River to the south, facing north towards the college complex. The bank below is densely vegetated with mature trees and undergrowth, enclosed by a timber fence from the northeast and northwest corners. In front of the house, grass slopes down towards a nearby three-storey college block. Access is via concrete steps from the path around this building, leading to a path of concrete flagstones set stepping-stone style into the grass. Although well maintained, the building is somewhat overwhelmed by its larger modern neighbour.

The building appears on the Ordnance Survey map of 1833–34, though unmarked. The legend 'summer ho.' appears on the revised map of 1857, though it is difficult to discern any actual structure. Nothing is marked on the second edition map of around 1905, but the 1938 map bears the legend 'Swift's House'. The building itself may predate 1833, though dating with certainty is difficult, as with much of the original Loughry structures.

The house has been traditionally associated with Jonathan Swift (1667–1745), the celebrated poet, satirist, pamphleteer and cleric. Robert Lindesay (1679–1742), the fourth owner of Loughry, who became Member of Parliament for County Tyrone in 1726 and Judge of the Common Pleas in 1733, was a close friend and legal advisor to Swift. According to family historian Ernest Godfrey, Swift was a frequent visitor to Loughry and wrote many of his poems and other works in the summer house, including part of his political satire The Tale of a Tub, published in 1704. However, this association is difficult to verify, and Swift's connection to the area and this building may have been exaggerated, possibly through Godfrey's own writings.

Despite its uncertain history, the building provides testament to the variety of structures that comprised a country estate, its simple cubic proportions and minimal interior geometry being pleasing and refreshing in character.