Pendennis Castle, Cornwall, England

Pendennis Castle (Cornish: Kastel Penndinas)[1] is a Device Fort, or Henrician castle, on the west side of the estuary of the River Fal, near Falmouth in Cornwall. Together with St Mawes Castle its companion fort on the opposite east bank, it was built by King Henry VIII between 1539 and 1545 to guard the entrance to River and to defend Carrick Roads from the perceived French and Spanish threat of naval attack.[2] The castle comprises a simple round tower and gatehouse enclosed by a lower curtain wall. It is now in the ownership of English Heritage.

Construction

Pendennis Castle was built as one of a chain of forts running along the coast of the southern half of Great Britain from Hull in the east to Milford Haven in the west. The building programme was in response to the threat of invasion by the French and Spanish, following the rejection of the Roman Catholic religion by King Henry VIII and the adoption of Protestantism at the Reformation. The Pope had asked the catholic kings of France and Spain to invade England to perform a restoration of the Catholic faith. The English were aware that the French and Spanish were familiar with the strategic area of the Carrick Roads, perhaps as an anchorage from which to launch a land invasion, having had a naval battle there shortly before, and knew it to be largely unprotected. It thus appeared urgent to Henry that defences were required.

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Siege of 1646

Pendennis Castle played an important role in the Civil War and was the last Royalist position to be held in the Westcountry and was the last Royal castle to fall in England. A Royalist garrison withstood there a five-month siege (March 1646 to 17 August 1646) from Parliamentarian forces before surrendering with honour. The Parliamentarian forces attacked the castle from both land and sea, when the Royalist garrison at Pendennis, largely formed of Cornishmen was under the command of the 70-year-old John VII Arundel (1576-1654) of Trerice. Pendennis was the third from the last stronghold, before Raglan Castle and Harlech Castle, to hold out for the Royalists. About 1,000 men, women and children survived the 155-day siege at the castle before being forced to surrender due to of starvation.[3] Previously it had given sanctuary to Queen Henrietta Maria, and the Prince of Wales (the future King Charles II), before their escape to France.[4][5]

List of Governors

The first Governor appointed by King Henry VIII was John III Killigrew (d.1567) of Arwennack, Falmouth[6] whose monumental brass survives in Budock Church. The Governorship became virtually hereditary in his family for several generations.

• John III Killigrew (d.1567) of Arwenack, Falmouth, first Governor, appointed by King Henry VIII.[1] His monumental brass survives in St Budock's Church, Budock Water, near Falmouth, inscribed as follows:

"Heere lyeth John Killigrew, Esquier, of Arwenack and lord of ye manor of Killigrew in Cornewall, and Elizabeth Trewinnard his wife. He was the first Captaine of Pendennis Castle, made by King Henry the eight and so continued untill the nynth of Queene Elizabeth at which time God tooke him to his mercye, being the yeare of Our Lord 1567. Sr John Killigrew, Knight, his son(n)e succeeded him in ye same place by the gift of Queene Elizabeth".

• 1567–1583/4: Sir John IV Killigrew (d.1583/4) of Arwenack, son, 2nd Governor,[3] appointed by Queen Elizabeth I, as stated on his father's brass in St Budock's Church.
• 1584–1598: John V Killigrew (c.1557-1605), of Arwennack, son, 3rd Governor.[4]
• 1598–1603: Sir Nicholas Parker (d. 1603)[5] An inscribed slate ledger stone in his memory exists against the south wall of the chancel of St Budock's Church.[6]
• Sir John Parker
• Sir Nicholas Hals
• 1628-April 1635: Sir Robert Killigrew (d.1633/5) of Hanworth, Middlesex, jointly with his eldest son Sir William Killigrew (1606–1695)[7] of Kempton Park, Middlesex, a grandson and great-grandson respectively of John Killigrew (d.1567) of Arwennack, the first Governor.[8]
• April 1635-1643: Sir Nicholas Slanning (1606-1643),[9] a Royalist commander during the Civil War. His widow Gertrude Bagg remarried to Richard Arundell, 1st Baron Arundell of Trerice (c.1616-1687), the 2nd son of the next Governor.
• c.1643–1646: Sir John VII Arundell (1576–1654), of Trerice, nicknamed "Jack-for-the-King". During the Civil War in 1646 he held the castle for King Charles I, and withstood a five month long siege by Parliamentarian forces, at the end of which his forces were reduced by hunger to eating their horses. He obtained an honourable surrender.
• 1646–1648: Col. Richard Fortescue (d.1657), for Parliament. His relationship to the prominent Devonshire family of Fortescue of Filleigh and Weare Giffard is unclear. He was seated at Hickfield in the county of Southampton, and was later Commander-in-Chief in Jamaica, where he died in 1657.[10]
• 1648-1649: John Fox, for Parliament/Commonwealth.[11]
• 1649–1658?: Sir Hardres Waller, for Parliament/Commonwealth.[12]
• 1659–1660: Anthony Rowse, for Parliament/Commonwealth.
• 1660–1662: Sir Peter Killigrew, 2nd Baronet (c. 1634-1704), appointed at the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660, by General George Monck.[13] A grandson of the 3rd Governor John V Killigrew (c.1557-1605), of Arwennack.
• 1662: Richard Arundell, 1st Baron Arundell of Trerice (c.1616-1687), 2nd son of Governor Sir John VII Arundell (1576–1654), of Trerice, "Jack-for-the-King".
• 1680–1696: John Granville, 1st Earl of Bath (1628-1701), of Stowe, Kilkhampton, Cornwall, who played a leading role in the Restoration of the Monarchy of 1660. He was a cousin of the Arundells of Trerice.[14]
• 1696–1703: Bevil Granville (d.1706), a nephew of the previous Governor John Granville, 1st Earl of Bath (1628-1701)
• 1703–1714: George Granville, 1st Baron Lansdowne, successor to his brother, Governor Bevil Granville (d.1706)
• 1714–1725: Richard Munden
• 1726–1734: John Hobart
• 1735–1737: James Tyrrell
• 1737–1749: William Barrell[15]
• 1749–1753: John Laforey
• 1753–1774: Arthur Owen[16]
• 1774–1775: Charles Beauclerk[17]
• 1775–1793: Robert Robinson
• 1793–1823: Felix Buckley
• 1823–1832: Sir Martin Hunter
• 1832–1837: Paul Anderson[18]
• office abolished

Lieutenant-Governors of Pendennis

• 1729–1739?: John Folliott
• ?–1747: Daniel Houghton
• 1747–?: John Waite[19]
• 1749–1769: Richard Bowles[20]
• 1769–1776: William Fawcett
• 1776–1797: Nevinson Poole[21]
• 1797–1811: Philip Melvill
• 1811–1814: James Considine[22]
• 1814–1832: William Fenwick[23]
• 1832–1835: Loftus Grey
• office abolished

Associated fortifications

Crab Quay[7] lies below Pendennis Castle on the northeast face of the headland. It is the most suitable location for a landing, and a battery was built here in the late 17th or early 18th century, first recorded on a map of 1715. Below Crab Quay battery are five "D"-shaped concrete platforms just above the water level. These were the foundations for searchlights supporting the Middle Point battery. All surface structures belonging to Middle Point were demolished in the 1960s.

The Little Dennis Blockhouse was built as part of the wider defences of the castle in the 1540s. The blockhouse was a stone, D-shaped building overlooking the River Fal and the sea. It was dismantled in 1654.[8]

References

Jump up ^ Place-names in the Standard Written Form (SWF) : List of place-names agreed by the MAGA Signage Panel. Cornish Language Partnership.
Jump up ^ Philip Payton. (1996). Cornwall. Fowey: Alexander Associates Jump up ^ BBC News 2006 – Pendennis Castle Jump up ^ Pendennis Castle – history Jump up ^ Philip Payton (1996). Cornwall. Fowey: Alexander Associates Jump up ^ Dunkin, Edwin Hadlow Wise, The Monumental Brasses of Cornwall with Descriptive, Geneaological and Heraldic Notes, 1882, pp.36-7 Jump up ^ Jenkins, S., "Crab Quay Battery", Fort (Fortress Study Group), No. 37, 2009, pp. 3–14 Jump up ^ "Little Dennis Blockhouse", Historic England, retrieved 10 May 2015

Further reading

Colvin, H. M. (ed) (1982). The History of the King's Works, Vol. IV, 1485–1600, Part II. London: H.M. Stationery Office Fry, Plantagenet Somerset (1980) The David & Charles Book of Castles. Newton Abbot: David & Charles ISBN 0-7153-7976-3 Harrington, Peter (2007). The Castles of Henry VIII. Oxford: Osprey ISBN 978-1-84603-130-4 Jenkins, S., "Pendennis Castle, Cornwall", Fort (Fortress Study Group), No. 25, 1997, pp. 169–235 Linzey, Richard (1999). The Castles of Pendennis and St. Mawes. London: English Heritage ISBN 1-85074-723-7 Morley, B. M. (1976). Henry VIII and the Development of Coastal Defence. London: H.M. Stationery Office ISBN 0-11-670777-1

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Pendennis Castle. Pendennis Castle - official site at English Heritage Bibliography of sources relating to Pendennis Castle Read a detailed historical record on Pendennis Castle