Pendennis Castle
Pendennis Castle is an artillery fort constructed by Henry VIII near Falmouth, Cornwall, England between 1540 and 1542. It formed part of the King's Device programme to protect against invasion from France and the Holy Roman Empire, and defended the Carrick Roads waterway at the mouth of the River Fal. The original, circular keep and gun platform was expanded at the end of the century to cope with the increasing Spanish threat, with a ring of extensive stone ramparts and bastions built around the older castle. Pendennis saw service during the English Civil War, when it was held by the Royalists, and was only taken by Parliament after a long siege in 1646. It survived the interregnum and Charles II renovated the fortress after his restoration to the throne in 1660.
Ongoing concerns about a possible French invasion resulted in Pendennis's defences being modernised and upgraded in the 1730s and again during the 1790s; during the Napoleonic Wars, the castle held up to 48 guns. In the 1880s and 1890s an electrically operated minefield was laid across the River Fal, operated from Pendennis and St Mawes, and new, quick-firing guns were installed to support these defences. The castle was rearmed during the First World War but saw no action and was rearmed again during the Second World War when it saw action against the German Luftwaffe aircraft, but in 1956, by now obsolete, it was decommissioned. It passed into the control of the Ministry of Works, who cleared away many of the more modern military buildings and opened the site to visitors. In the 21st century, the castle is managed by English Heritage as a tourist attraction, receiving 74,230 visitors in 2011–12. The heritage agency Historic England considers Pendennis to be "one of the finest examples of a post-medieval defensive promontory fort in the country".
History
16th–17th centuries
Construction
Pendennis Castle was built as a consequence of international tensions between England, France and the Holy Roman Empire in the final years of the reign of King Henry VIII. Traditionally the Crown had left coastal defences to the local lords and communities, only taking a modest role in building and maintaining fortifications, and while France and the Empire remained in conflict with one another, maritime raids were common but an actual invasion of England seemed unlikely. Basic defences, based around simple blockhouses and towers, existed in the south-west and along the Sussex coast, with a few more impressive works in the north of England, but in general the fortifications were very limited in scale.In 1533, Henry broke with Pope Paul III in order to annul the long-standing marriage to his wife, Catherine of Aragon and remarry. Catherine was the aunt of Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, and he took the annulment as a personal insult. This resulted in France and the Empire declaring an alliance against Henry in 1538, and the Pope encouraging the two countries to attack England. An invasion of England appeared certain. In response, Henry issued an order, called a "device", in 1539, giving instructions for the "defence of the realm in time of invasion" and the construction of forts along the English coastline.
The stretch of water known as Carrick Roads at the mouth of the River Fal was an important anchorage serving shipping arriving from the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. A small gun tower, called the Little Dennis Blockhouse, was built in 1539 overlooking the entrance, and plans were made to protect the anchorage further with five additional castles. In the event, only two of these were constructed, Pendennis and St Mawes Castle, positioned on each side of Carrick Roads and able to provide overlapping fire across the water. John Killigrew, a prominent member of the local Cornish gentry, probably oversaw the construction of Pendennis; it was built on his land and he was appointed as its first captain. Pendennis Castle cost £5,614 to construct.
Initial operation
The Killigrews controlled the castle for several decades, with John Killigrew's son and grandson continuing in turn as the captain there until 1605. The captains of Pendennis frequently argued with those of St Mawes and in 1630 a legal dispute broke out about the rights to search and detain incoming shipping: both castles argued that they had a traditional right to do so. The Admiralty eventually issued a compromise, proposing that the castles share the searching of the traffic.Meanwhile, a lasting peace with France was made in 1558 and the initial invasion threat passed. The Spanish threat to the south-west of England became more serious, however, and war broke out in 1569. As a result, a defensive earthwork was constructed north-west of the castle to protect it against an attack from the land, and an additional gun battery facing upriver was installed alongside the blockhouse. The levels of the garrison varied considerably during the period. Pendennis had a garrison of 100 men in 1578, and could have mustered around 500 men in 1596, while in 1599 it was reportedly guarded by 200 soldiers.
The Spanish threat continued; raiding parties destroyed the Killigrews' family home at Arwenack in 1593, and four Spanish ships attacked the towns along the coast in 1595. In 1597 a Spanish fleet with 20,000 men set out to assault Pendennis and invade England, only being prevented from landing by bad weather. The failed attack caused considerable concern inside government and the privy council were informed that the castle was not sufficient to prevent a Spanish landing along the coast. A subsequent review carried out by Sir Nicholas Parker, Sir Walter Raleigh and Sir Ferdinando Gorges recommended that the castle's defences should be significantly extended. The military engineer Paul Ivey constructed an Italian-styled ring of earthworks, embrasures, bastions and a stone-revetted ditch around the original Henrician castle between 1597 and 1600, using a team of 400 local workers, costing around £80 a week in wages.
In the early 1600s England was at peace and Pendennis was neglected; reportedly the garrison's pay was two years in arrears, forcing them to gather limpets from the shoreline for food. Nonetheless, a new Italian-styled gatehouse was added to the castle, probably in 1611. War with Spain broke out again 1624 and a new defensive line, with bastions and artillery, was built across the peninsula in 1627.
English Civil War and Restoration
When civil war broke out in 1642 between King Charles I and Parliament, Pendennis and the south-west of England were held by the Royalists. The growing town of Falmouth was a strategically important part of their supply route to the Continent, while Carrick Roads formed a base for Royalist piracy in the English Channel. As the war turned in favour of the Parliamentarians, preparations were made for Prince Charles to shelter there over the winter of 1645–46, as part of which the surrounding fortifications were improved; in the event, Charles stayed in the castle only briefly in early 1646.Shortly after Charles left Pendennis for the Isles of Scilly on 2 March, Thomas Fairfax entered Cornwall with a substantial army. Almost all the other Royalist positions in England had by now fallen and St Mawes Castle surrendered immediately as Fairfax approached. Pendennis Castle, however, continued to hold out, defended by around 1,000 soldiers under the command of Sir John Arundell. They were determined to hold out against the besiegers and Arundell announced that he would die rather than surrender. Two Parliamentary colonels, Fortescue and Hammond, directed the bombardment of the castle from the land, while Captain Batten, with a flotilla of ten ships, blockaded it by sea, preventing fresh supplies from arriving.
The garrison's defences were supported with artillery fire from a Royalist warship that was deliberately run aground north of the castle to produce an additional gun platform. By July, food had begun to run short and some of the garrison unsuccessfully attempted to break out by sea to acquire supplies. Arundell agreed to an honourable surrender on 15 August, and around 900 survivors left the fort two days later, some terminally ill from malnutrition. Pendennis was the penultimate Royalist fortification to hold out in the war.
Parliament maintained a garrison at the castle, but in 1647 it cut the levels of the armed forces across the country; most soldiers who lost their posts were offered two months pay, but at Pendennis only one month's pay was offered. The garrison, led by Colonel Richard Fortescue, mutinied, seized the visiting Parliamentary commissioners and refused to leave the castle until the additional pay was granted to them. Fearing a wider uprising, Parliament negotiated an end to the confrontation, paying off the garrison in full and offering Fortescue fresh employment elsewhere. A smaller, more reliable garrison was then installed. During the interregnum, the castle was used to imprison the radical pamphleteer William Prynne.
Just before the restoration of King Charles II to the throne in 1660, the Royalist Sir Peter Killigrew became the new captain of the castle. Fears of an invasion continued, and an additional gun battery was constructed at Crab Quay, to the south-east of the main fortification. At the end of the century, a new guard barracks and gate were constructed, probably emulating those being constructed in France.
18th–19th centuries
Pendennis Castle continued in use through the 18th and 19th centuries under the command of successive captains, still operating in partnership with St Mawes. In 1714, Colonel Christian Lilly carried out an inspection of the fortification, finding it to be "in a very precarious condition" and noting that "the body of the fort having been for many years neglected is now is in a very ruinous condition". The parapets had collapsed, the ramparts could easily be scaled and the ditches were filled with brambles. Little was done to remedy this, however, until the 1730s, when the castle was extensively modernised. The interior was redesigned, the ramparts were rebuilt and the castle's guns were replaced, incorporating new 18-pounder cannons.During the American Revolutionary War, France allied itself with the revolutionaries, causing war with Britain to break out in 1778. The French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars followed, during which period Falmouth became an important military depot. In 1795, the Crown purchased the castle's land from the Killigrew family, and reinforced the fortress to deal with the fresh threat of invasion. The government installed more guns and built a new gun position called the Half-Moon Battery just outside the 16th-century walls; the landward defences of Pendennis were reinforced, and a new barracks and other ancillary buildings were built inside the fortress. At its peak, the castle was equipped with up to 48 artillery pieces. A new volunteer unit of artillery was formed in Falmouth to support the forts around the harbour, many of them carrying out training using Pendennis's guns before then deploying elsewhere across Cornwall.
After the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815, Pendennis was neglected; many of its guns became unserviceable and some buildings fell into ruin. The old post of captain of Pendennis Castle was abolished in 1837, with the fortification commanded by a conventional military appointment. In the 1850s, renewed fears of a French invasion led to investment in new artillery at the castle, and nineteen 32- and 56-pounder guns were installed. Falmouth continued to be an important harbour, particularly for the Royal Navy. When new concerns about France emerged, an electrically operated minefield was laid across Carrick Roads in 1885, jointly controlled from Pendennis and St Mawes. New 6- and 12-pounder quick-firing guns, supported by machine-guns for close defence, were assigned to the castle to deal with the emerging threat from enemy torpedo boats.