[1] For two hundred years, the Carton Demesne was the finest example in Ireland of a Georgian-created parkland landscape.

[2] The Carton Demesne first came into the ownership of the FitzGerald family shortly after Maurice FitzGerald, Lord of Lanstephan (c. 1105–1176), an Anglo-Norman noble, played an active role in the capture of Dublin by the Normans in 1170 and was rewarded by being appointed Lord of Maynooth, an area covering townlands which include Carton.

The house and lands were forfeited to the Crown in 1691 and in 1703 sold to Major-General Richard Ingoldsby, Master General of the Ordnance.

In 1739, as the Ingoldsby family had lost most of their money, the lease was sold back to the 19th Earl of Kildare, who employed Richard Cassels (1690–1751) to design the existing house.

Lady Emily played an important role in the development of the house and estate as it is today.

Carton remained in the control of the FitzGeralds until the early twentieth century when the 7th Duke of Leinster (1892–1976) sold his life interest to a moneylender,[citation needed] Sir Harry Mallaby-Deeley, to pay off gambling debts of £67,500.

His eldest brother was the 6th Duke of Leinster (1887–1922), who had succeeded as a child to the dukedom and estates in December 1893 but who suffered from serious psychiatric issues; the 6th Duke lived from 1907 until his death in February 1922 in a house in the grounds of Craig House Psychiatric Hospital in Edinburgh.

So, Lord Edward inherited the dukedom and what remained of the Carton Estate in February 1922, thus becoming the 7th Duke.

[citation needed] During the Second World War, Carton House was occupied by the Irish Army who used the building as the headquarters of the 2nd Infantry Division.

[4] In 1949 the house was purchased by the 2nd Baron Brocket (1904–1967), a multi-millionaire Tory peer and businessman and a member, by descent, of the ancient Ulster family of Ó Catháin (O'Cahan or O'Kane),[5] whose principal residence was Brocket Hall in Hertfordshire, England.

David Nall-Cain who, having moved to the Isle of Man, sold the house in 1977[6] to the Mallaghan family.

[8] Director Blake Edwards and wife actress, Julie Andrews, lived in Carton House over the summer and autumn of 1969 while filming the movie Darling Lili (1970).

A hotel was added to the main house, altering it drastically, while the estate's eighteenth-century grounds were converted into two golf courses.

The former is a parkland course, utilising the rolling land of the estate as well as the waters of the River Rye, while the latter is an inland links[11] and features head high pot bunkers, "fast-running" greens and narrow fairways.

The winner was England's Paul Casey with a −5 (67) on the final day including an eagle on the last for a total of −14 to win by 3.

During an interview for Irish TV, Wolves manager Mick McCarthy stated that Middlesbrough FC would be there later.