The Dartry estate lies to the right all along the road towards Rockcorry. The boundary wall, much of it remaining, was built as a famine relief scheme in 1847; workers received 1d per day. Some gatehouses to the Dartry Estate also remain.
The Dartry estate, now owned and forested by Coillte, was once the home of the Dawsons, one of Monaghan’s most powerful families. Richard Dawson received the first grant of 4,000 acres in the Cromwellian settlements in 1667. The Dawsons became a very powerful family; four of the family were MP’s for Monaghan and nine were high-sheriffs of the county. In the 1710s the Dawson Family erected a beautiful Georgian mansion on the estate. Nothing remains of this once magnificent building. On the left along the Cootehill/Rockcorry road stand the Dawson monument, erected in memory of Richard Dawson MP who died in 1807. It is a tall limestone Corinthian column surrounded by and urn and decorated on two sides by the family coat of arms. The other two sides bear the following inscription;
This column was erected by the free and independent electors of the county of Monaghan to perpetuate the memory of Richard Dawson, Esq., who was unanimously returned by them to 5 successive parliaments. He died their faithful representative on 3rd September 1807, aged 44 years.
There are excellent walks through the Dartry estate, now known as Dartry Forest. The old church and graveyard at Kilcrow (where Brigadier Eric Dorman O Gorman is buried) is a little further to the right, past the Monument. The graveyard at Kilcrow contains the graves of several members of the Dawson family (who built the church), including the last surviving member of the family, Lady Edith Anne Wyndham Dawson who died in 1974.
The ancient burial ground at Edergole stand on elevated ground above the present Holy Trinity Church. There are many interesting tombs in this graveyard including a memorial to two McMahon brothers, Bernard and Ross, who were Bishops of Clogher and Archbishop of Armagh.
