Mayo history: Lord Lucan saga lingers on after 50 years

By Tom Gillespie

FIFTY years ago the sudden disappearance of an English peer catapulted Castlebar into the national and international headlines.

It came about when Lord ‘Lucky’ Lucan vanished in November 1974, following the brutal murder of his children’s nanny, Sandra Rivett.

The Lucan connections with Castlebar date back to the 1500s. The Third Earl of Lucan owned 62,000 acres of land in the town 150 years ago.

His son, Charles George Bingham, who died in June 1914, sold the family estate and handed over his cricket pitch, now the town’s Mall, and other sites for churches and schools to the people the town.

However, the ground rents on most of the properties, including Lucan Street, one of the oldest streets in the town, were retained by the family.

This caused an uproar in Castlebar following the murder allegations when householders and business people refused to pay the rents to Lucan’s agent in the town, the late solicitor, Michael Joe Egan.

It was estimated that up to £30,000 per annum could have been owing to the estate. But over 1,000 property owners were withholding the levies and a campaign was launched to have the rents system abolished.

The main campaigner against the rents system was the late Fianna Fáil county councillor Dick Morrin, who got so under Mr. Egan’s skin that Mr. Egan wrote the following letter to the editor of The Connaught Telegraph on August 30, 1988.

“Dear Sir, Councillor Dick Morrin is squeezing every conceivable bit of publicity out of the Lord Lucan saga, and to ensure publicity in your paper, the English press and radio, he fabricates a story for which there is no basis whatsoever.

“Mr. Morrin is not a tenant on the Lucan Estate, and, as agent, I wish to inform him that I have no difficulty in collecting the ground rents about which he claims to know so much.

“It would suit him better if in his pursuit of publicity he spoke about something on which he is qualified to speak.”

The old Connaught Telegraph premises on Cavendish Lane, Castlebar, were subject to the payment of the Lucan ground rents.

And on May 29, 1992, an arrears demand (pictured below) for £51.80 was sent to my late uncle, Thomas H. Gillespie, with the enclosed note: ‘Despite the annual reminders sent to you in respect of arrears of rent, you have made no effort to discharging your liabilities.

‘The Trustees of the Lucan Estate have issued an instruction that proceedings be initiated against defaulters. The issue of proceedings will be deferred for 10 days from this date’.

The non- payment of the rent, however, continued for another three years. But when the new offices of The Connaught Telegraph were being built in 1995/6, the levies had to be paid to allow the development take place.

Following the 1992 threat of legal action the first moves to recover outstanding ground rents was initiated.

Coutts & Company, of 440 Strand, London, acting as trustees of the Lucan estate, took a civil action against the owner of a Castlebar licensed premises for rent due for a 16-year period.

They sought a decree for £59.68, with costs, against psychiatric nurse, the late Patrick Cannon of Ballymacgrath, Castlebar.

The amount, they claimed, represented arrears of an annual rent of £3.73 for the premises The Bungalow Bar, Bridge Street, Castlebar.

However, when the matter came before Castlebar District Court on July 1, 1992, Miss Eanya Egan, solicitor of Egan Daughter & Company, representing Coutts, applied before Judge Patrick Brennan to have the matter struck out as the ‘wrong party was being sued’.

She said while she was not afraid of the press coverage she would prefer not to go into the reasons for taking the action against the wrong person.

Mr. Thomas Walsh, solicitor (defending), said if a search had been carried out the name of the correct defendant would have been found. He applied for costs in the case.

Miss Egan said she was not opposing the costs application but stated: “He will get them the same way we will get our rent.”

Judge Brennan struck out the proceedings and awarded £60 costs in favour of Mr. Cannon.

Following the case, Mr. Cannon said: “I think I’m the first man ever to be awarded money in a court case against Lord Lucan. But maybe I’m going to have to serve a summons on the man himself to have a chance of getting it.

“We all feel this ground rent businesses an injustice. It’s only a few pounds a year, but we’re not paying to some invisible person.”

Lucan vanished after the murder of Miss Rivet (27) at the family’s exclusive mews home in Belgravia, Central London, on November 7, 1974.

Lucan had run up huge gambling debts, his volatile marriage to Lady Veronica Lucan had collapsed, and the couple were going through a bitter custody battle over their three children.

Police believed he attacked Miss Rivett with a taped-up piece of lead piping after mistaking her for his wife.