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Summary

The Henrician round tower, the central element of Pendennis Castle, is thought to have been built 1540-1545. The last phase of work to be completed during this period was the erection of the gatehouse comprising of a pair of three storey crenellated towers flanking a gateway.

Protected Status

• Conservation Area: FALMOUTH
• Scheduled Monument 10552: PENDENNIS PENINSULA FORTIFICATIONS

Other References/Statuses

• OS No. (OS Quarter-sheet and OS No.): SW83SW 4
• Primary Record No. (1985-2009): 18709.21
• SMR No. (OS Quarter-sheet and SMR No.): SW83SW 9

Monument Type(s):

• KEEP (Post Medieval - 1540 AD to 1900 AD)

Full description

The Henrician round tower, the central element of Pendennis Castle, is thought to have been built 1540-1545. The last phase of work to be completed during this period was the erection of the gatehouse comprising of a pair of three storey crenellated towers flanking a gateway. Only parts of the plinth of this building survive, having been re-used as footings for the present forebuilding for which no known architectural precedent exists (21).

This forebuilding was constructed after Lord Burghley made a coloured platt in 1579, and before a plan created by Norden in 1597.

The governors lodging was added against its north side in 1550 (b18).

The central round tower was entered through a portcullised door (originally with a drawbridge) and contains a basement with hearths and ovens. This would have housed a kitchen in which there was a large fireplace for cooking. It was formerly subdivided by partitions wwhich seperated food storage and dairy. An unexplained system of drains and culverts lie beneath the stone paving in the basement, and one of the original floor drains can be seen being used as a kerbstone on the incline of the road after it has passed through the gate in the Elizabethan enceinte. This drain matches those at St Mawes Castle.

Two gun decks were above, on the ground and first floors, each octagonal in interior plan with 7 gun positions. Artillery was mounted on wheeled carriages which fired through widely splayed embrasures. Chimneys above each piece of ordnance on the first floor were intended to carry away the gunsmoke. The lower gun deck was superceded by an external gun deck almost immediately and it may have formed part of the same construction contract as the main drum of the castle. The ground floor could not have operated as a gun deck from its position behind the chemise which probably superseded it. A Henrican powder magazine was recorded by Lilly in 1715 as being located in a long passage serving the rooms on the ground floor of the tower.

The roof is a gun platform, with a lookout provided with a fireplace above the spiral stairs within the wall of the main tower. On a plan thought to date to 1700 a circular feature appears on the roof of the tower. Lilly produced detailed plans of the castle in 1715 in which he shows this feature in section. It is drawn about the same height as the parapet, covered with a low conically pitched roof.

The governor's lodging consists of 3 rooms - a parlour or bed chamber, another chamber, and a kitchen - with a viewing platform on its roof (b18).

The two granite columns at the escarp end of the bridge, although they do not appear on earlier plans, are still thought to be part of the original drawbridge structure. The vacant corbel tables may have supported a lintel over which the drawbridge chains would pass, counterbalanced by the portcullis within the forebuilding. A lintel seems to be shown on drawings made by a Dutch spy in the 1620s (21).

Lilly's survey of 1715 shows the first floor of the tower in plan, sub-divided by partitions. The functions allotted to these rooms make it clear that wheeled guns were no longer used on this floor at this stage. This was a house which Lilly calls the 'Governor's Lodging'. The principal gun deck, connected to the forebuilding by a narrow passage, now contained five bedchambers and closets including the Governor's bedchamber overlooking the parade ground. Also within the forebuilding was the dining room. Lilly shows the ground floor divided into six spaces, each lit by one embrasure, served by a corridor, the long passage, across the diameter in which Lilly mentions 'powder formerly stored'. The accommodation in the forebuilding was described as a 'parler' and a 'little kitchen' served by two closets. Lilly's elevations show that the inspiration for the elaborate stone chimney on the forebuilding was the ogee domed lead-roofed look-out tower on the roof of the keep.

In 1717 the castle was struck by lightning which dislodged 500-600 cwt of stone and 'rendered that part for a time inhabitable'.

In a plan of the Governor's Lodging, produced by the Royal Engineers in 1791, the Tudor forebuilding is described as containing a parlour, kitchen, drawing room, bedroom, smaller bedroom and one dressing closet. The leads of the roof were described as 'in need of repair'. The accommodation in the artillery tower was listed as two bedrooms, one for servants; dairy; cellar; parlour and lumber room. All the roof embrasures of the main tower parapet are shown blocked with a firing step behind indicating that it had been altered for close defence by infantry as a 'keep of last resort'. The lean-to shown on the plan by Lilly in 1715 is identified in the 1791 plan as 'boghouses in repair'. These continued to be used up until the First World War and are still intact. No sign of the wooden pentice is shown (21).

On an Ordnance Storekeepers plan of 1811 the castle is described as 'the round tower and Governor's guardhouse', and in June 1821 as 'the Governor's House'.

Between 1830 and 1833 Ordnance 'Out Letters' contain reports of repairs throughout the keep, providing information about the functions of the rooms at this time, as well as their materials of construction and occassionally the colours of their interiors.

The post of Governor was abolished in 1837 and the keep, now known as Castle House, was let to a Francis Todd, between 1844 and 1847.

Officers displaced from an old barracks in 1849 used the house as 'officers quarters and mess room'. Elevations and sections of the castle made at this time indicate that amongst those quartered within were the Quartermaster Sergeant in a slate-hung carbuncle built on the roof of the forebuilding (now removed) and in the King's Room on the first floor. The parlour is described as 'orderly room'. Within the main tower on the ground floor the partitions remained and these rooms were used as officer's bedrooms. At the end of the long passage was a large walk-in larder. In section, the doors of each of these rooms is shown as panelled. The bedchambers of the first floor are no longer shown and instead the room is fitted with racking to serve as an armoury heated by a stove in the centre of the space. The drawings clearly show that the roof has been reconstructed pitched and the 'expense magazine' on the roof removed.

An Ordnance Survey of 1866 indicates the basement of the Tudor forebuilding served as a coal cellar, whilst the ground floor contained the Militia Orderly Room and the Quartermaster Sergeant's kitchen. The round tower contained the militia stores on the ground floor and the Royal Engineers' stores in the great kitchen. On the roof of the tower, the three embrasures facing the harbour mouth and one overlooking Gyllingvase Beach are shown to have been re-opened in order to allow construction of chimneystacks on top of four old flues which had been converted to serve the officers' mess.

The Ordnance Survey of 1893 shows a semaphore turret on the main roof and the 1893 hydrographic survey notes 'a time ball is dropped at Pendennis Castle at 1pm GMT'.

In 1902 the forebuilding was reconstructed. The fine granite bridge on single cambered arch almost certainly dates to these alterations.

The Ordnance Survey of 1910 indicates a triangulation station on the north parapet of the tower and steps leading from the tower basement onto the chemise. A stair is shown leading down from the chemise to the parade ground adjacent to the privies. A survey by His Majesty's Office of Works on the roof of the main tower in 1912 show at the centre of the roof a 'coastguard house' entered from the north side, redundant since the reformation of the coastguard in 1909. There is a wind gauge fitted at the south west corner and an iron stepladder providing access to the roof at the north east end. This building almost certainly contained flags for use when Pendennis was the 'Port War Signal Station' (21).

The castle was once again desingated an officers' mess during World War One, hosting regimental dinners and ceremonies.

On the 16th February 1921 the castle was transferred to His Majesty's Office of Works for upkeep as an ancient monument. In 1922 a colour sketch indicates a spiral staircase in the mian tower linking the ground and first floors.

Plans of 1930 made by the War Department show the internal arrangements at that time. The ground floor retained most of its partioning. The iron spiral staircase connecting ground and first floors is still shown and a lift beween the basement and first floor is shown. The large square masonry mass which can be seen in the basement today is first shown on this plan and probably helped to support the ground and first floors by wooden posts above.

Between the wars the castle was consolidated and a number of later features removed, including the coastguard house. Some 'medieval style' doors were made for the forebuilding and access via the chemise was blocked.

The Keep was used as Officer's Living Quarters and mess and as an Observation Post and headquarters for the Falmouth Fortress fire commander for the Falmouth batteries during WW2. POSITIOING Half Moon Battery was built on the roof of the tower behind one of the Tudor merlons of the south face between 1939 and 1941 but was removed after the war. During the war the castle was considered to be the heart of the fortress, itself defended by a number of Strong Posts. These are described in the Fort Record Book as 'one lower embrasure and windows; manned by officers mess staff. Six men on orders from the Fire Commander, two upper embrasures any by reserve fire commander's watch on orders from the Fire Commander'. Their task was to attack enemy troops with rifles and grenades if they succeeded in entering the castle grounds.

After the war the castle remained in army hands because of the proximity of so much secret radar equipment. In 1957 it reopened as a tourist attraction as it remains today (21).

Morley describes the castle as built mostly of finely cut granite, with decorated string courses, gargoyles and embattled turrets.

Pasfield Oliver gives the height of the tower as 10.6m, the external diameter as 17.1m, and the thickness of the walls as 3.35m (b11).

--------------------------------
Site history:
1: 1927. DRAKE, S/IAM
3: 1987. WESTON, SM/IAM
4: 1988. HARTGROVES, S/CAU
5: 1988. HARTGROVES, S/CAU
--------------------------------

Tyers, I, 2004, Tree-Ring Analysis of Oak Timbers from Pendennis Castle, Near Falmouth, Cornwall (Cornwall Event Report). SCO25923.

<1> Hals, W, 1740, The Compleat History of Cornwall, 129 (Bibliographic reference). SCO3429.

<2> Lilly, C, 1715, An Exact Plan of Pendennis Fort (Bibliographic reference). SCO3870.

<3> Norden, J, 1728, Speculi Britanniae Pars (Bibliographic reference). SCO4001.

<4> Polwhele, R, 1803, History of Cornwall (Bibliographic reference). SCO4140.

<5> Lysons, D & S, 1814, Magna Britannia, VOL III, CORNWALL, 989, 99, 104 (Bibliographic reference). SCO3885.

<6> Hitchins, F & Drew, S (Eds), 1824, The History of Cornwall (Bibliographic reference). SCO3595.

<7> TREGONNING HOOPER, 1827, UNKNOWN TITLE, VOL I, NO 6, 7-9 (Unedited Source). SCO5851.

<8> Thomas, R, 1827, History and Description of the Town and Harbour of Falmouth, 110-113 (Bibliographic reference). SCO4698.

<9> Thomas, R, 1851, Letters to the West Briton (Article in newspaper). SCO4699.

<10> Brine, F, 1855, Shilling Trip to Falmouth (Bibliographic reference). SCO2906.

<11> Pasfield Oliver, S, 1875, Pendennis and St Mawes (Bibliographic reference). SCO4086.

<12> Beckett, R, 1961, Tercenteniary of Falmouth (Bibliographic reference). SCO2815.

<13> UNKNOWN, 1963, MOW GUIDE (Unedited Source). SCO7885.

<14> Carew, R, 1969, The Survey of Cornwall 1602 (Bibliographic reference). SCO3044.

<15> Institute Of Cornish Studies, 1987, Place-Names Index (Bibliographic reference). SCO3621.

<16> Padel, OJ, 1985, Cornish Place-Name Elements, 85, 177-180 (Bibliographic reference). SCO4064.

<17> Hartgroves, S & Sharpe, A & Roberts, C, 1985, Pendennis Castle and the Headland, Falmouth (Cornwall Event Report). SCO3459.

<18> Morley, B, 1988, The Castles of Pendennis and St Mawes (Bibliographic reference). SCO3957.

<19> Sharpe, A, 1989, Pendinas Castle (Cornwall Event Report). SCO4367.

<20> Walker, R, 1989, Pendennis Castle Resistivity Survey 1989 (Bibliographic reference). SCO5007.

<21> Linzey, R, 2000, Fortress Falmouth. An conservation plan for the historic defences of Falmouth Haven Vol II (2000), p82-89 (Cornwall Event Report). SCO1563.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events

• ECO4056 - Pendennis Castle: Tree-ring analysis of oak timbers (Ref: 38/2004)
• ECO455 - Fortress Falmouth

Related records

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