Dromore

364 George Street, Cobourg, Ontario

Built 1857, for Thomas Dumble (1802-1883) and his first wife, Eliza Hull (1806-1868). This Gothic villa is one of the few to survive in Cobourg from its era and still remains a private home to this day. It’s not to be confused with The Lawn that became known as the “Dumble Estate” from about 1920, nor with the similarly styled Dumble-Langton House in nearby Peterborough.

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The Dumble family on the front steps of "Dromore" circa 1869

Courtesy of the Cobourg Public Library

Thomas Dumble was a Captain in the Royal Engineers. He was stationed in Northern Ireland when he was called out to Canada to help settle a boundary dispute between New Brunswick and Maine - the Aroostook War. He remained in Canada, starting his own business surveying railways lines from Cobourg to Montreal and beyond.

Thomas and Eliza built their home on an acre of land in Cobourg and named it Dromore for the town in Northern Ireland where they were married. The high-pitched gable roof is unusual, but the Gothic architecture incorporated was just coming into fashion. Still seen woven into the brackets with their gingerbread trim is a motif that combines a “D” for Dumble with the Irish four-leafed clover.

Two years after the death of his first wife, John remarried Harriet Edgecumbe (1843-1883). They both died in 1883 when the house was left to John’s eldest son, John Henry Dumble (1829-1903). It was J.H. Dumble who took on the lease of the Cobourg & Peterborough Railway and attracted the interest of George King Shoenberger (1809-1892) of Pittsburgh. Shoenberger is remembered in Cobourg as one of the Americans who transformed it into the “Newport of the North” and his son-in-law built both Ravensworth and East House.

Dumble was married twice and had eleven children who grew up at Dromore. His second wife was Sarah Georgina Chatterton (1836-1921), the niece of Richard Dover Chatterton (1802-1885) who founded the Cobourg Star. Their eldest son, Lt.-Colonel Wilfrid Chatterton Dumble (1871-1963) became the third husband of Mary Estelle Brown (1876-c.1970) of Pittsburgh who owned The Lawn which then became known as the “Dumble Estate”.

Dromore is thought to have been passed to one of Colonel Dumble’s nephews: Cyril Dumble, John H. Capreol, Thomas Dumble, or Brigadier (Brian Mortimer) Roger Archibald (1906-1993). How long it remained in the Dumble family after this period is not yet known and it may have been used a summer residence for several members of the family. It still stands today and is still a private residence.