Castle - tower house

The National Monuments Service's description

Castle and bawn (LI022-053002-) located in the townland of Williamstown on the 1840 ed. OSi 6-inch map, however shown standing in the townland of Ballynagarde on the revised Cassini OSi 6-inch map. Westropp (1906-7, 90) recorded the following details about Williamstown or Ballywillin Castle and bawn; 'Perhaps Ballywillin C[astle], 1583 (Des. R., 37). 1625 Theo, or Tibbott Bourke, Williamstown C[astle]. except the "Geist Hall" (Inq. Chan., Car. I., 11). 1636 John, his son, held a room in it, with the bawn and a stone house in the north part of the C[astle]. (lb., Car. IL, 180). 1655 Lord Brittas, Dr. T. Arthur, and others claimed the C[astle]. and bawen (C.S., xxi., p. 35). 1666 Granted to Col. Clayton and W. Matthews, except the middle story, confirmed to Dr. Arthur's daughters (Act Sett.). Fabric - Fitzgerald describes it as a tower without outworks (I,p. 297). It was repaired and modernised by the Crokers, so O'Donovan failed to find it in 1840 (O.S.L. 8, pp. 151, 366)'. The 1654-56 Civil Survey of Limerick recorded that Theobald Lord Baron of Brittas, an Irish Papist, was the owner of Williamstown which contained 'a Castle and a Bawen' (Simington 1938, 81).
Described by the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage (NIAH) as a, 'Detached square-plan four-storey tower house with battered base, built c. 1550, with substantial additions in the nineteenth century. Stepped crenellations to battlements with carved limestone chimneystack to north-west corner and circular bartizan to south-east corner. Rubble limestone walls with cut and tooled quoins and cut limestone stringcourse beneath parapet. Square-headed openings with mixed single and paired lights having cut limestone surrounds. Loop openings to north-west corner. Square guardrobe opening to ground floor east elevation. Outbuilding to west of site having pitched corrugated-iron roofs and rubble limestone walls with red brick voussoirs to openings. Dressed limestone boundary wall to front of site with stepped crenellated copings. Square-profile limestone piers with crenellated caps flanking replacement wrought-iron gates' (www.buildingsofireland.ie; NIAH Reg. No. 21902228).
Classified by Donnelly (1999, 22, 31, 37) as a Type 4 tower house which consists of late tower houses and fortified houses of late 16th or 17th century which possess 'architectural features which include tourelles with shot holes, hood-moulded and mullioned windows, parapet water spouts and cruciform roofs'.
Williamstown Castle described by Salter (2004, 97) as follows; 'There is a circular bartizan with gunloops on the SW corner of this tower measuring 9m long by about 7.5m wide lying beside a road, and there is a turret over the staircase in the NW corner. The bartizan and parapet were repaired in the 19th century, when a number of other alterations were made. The fifth storey has two-light windows in the north and south end walls'.

Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien

Date of upload: 4 December 2020

References

Simington, R.C. (ed.) 1938 The civil survey, AD 1654-1656. Vol. IV: county of Limerick, with a section of Clanmaurice barony Co. Kerry. Dublin. Irish Manuscripts Commission.

Salter, M. 2004 The castles of North Munster. Worcestershire. Folly Publications.

Westropp, T.J. 1906-7 The ancient castles of the county of Limerick. Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 26, 54-264.

Donnelly, C.J. 1999 A Typological Study of the Tower Houses of County Limerick. Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 129, 19-39.