[2] From 1876, it became the official residence of the Private Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, who lived out of season in the next door Viceregal Lodge.

[5] In 1945, the wheelchair-using retiring first President of Ireland, Douglas Hyde, was judged too ill to return to his Roscommon country house, Ratra.

[6] On 18 June 1951 it became the headquarters of the newly formed Irish Civil Defence and renamed Ratra House.

The Irish Civil Defence School was relocated to Roscrea, County Tipperary in 2006,[7] but Ratra House remains in use as an administrative building.

[8] Parts of the complex are still used by the Civil Defence, such as the purpose-built training range used by firemen and rescue personnel.