The Gordon's had been spirit merchants, Alice and Roberts son David established Gordon and Company bankers, later to become The Belfast Banking Company. keeping it in the family again David married his his mother's cousin, Mary Crawford, of Crawfordsburn.

Alexander Gordon served from 1929-1949, as Unionist MP for East Down at Stormont. During this period he served as government Chief Whip. He was also Parliamentary and Financial Secretary to the Ministry of Finance from 1937. On 13 June 1940, however, he resigned this position as a result of, as he put it, the Northern Irish government being "quite unfitted to sustain the people in the ordeal (referring to the Belfast Blitz) we have to face." In 1950, Sir Alexander entered the upper House as a Senator.

Alexander and his wife had no children, on his death, in 1967, the estate of Delamont was held on trust by his great-nephew Archibald Arundel Pugh who changed his name by deed poll in 1968 to Gordon-Pugh.

In 1978, Mr Gordon-Pugh applied for, and obtained outline planning permission for, a hotel, marina and associated development along the shore, together with additional approval for a leisure park and golf course over the rest of the estate. He did not implement the proposals, although for a time the house was used as a restaurant and hired out for private parties and functions. However Delamont and the estate began to decline in the 1970s and they were finally sold by Mr Gordon-Pugh in 1985.

He sold the estate in 1985 to Belfast Education and Library Board.

In the 1800's, the Gordon estates were estimated at around 4,768 acres