Signal tower in Duichealla

Situated adjacent to steep sea cliffs adjacent to Bolus Point, and c. 1.1kms N of Bolus Head (c. 209m OD). Located on a small area of level ground with abrupt steep slopes to the W, NW and SW at the sea cliffs, and with an area of terrain that slopes away gradually to the E\ESE before rising again close to the enclosed barracks\signal station site (KE104-001----), which is located c. 600m away. The surrounding area consists of unenclosed blanket bog and rocky cliffs with areas of enclosed pasture further away to the NE and SE (c. 1km). The adjacent stations in the signal tower\station chain are found at Bray Head, Valentia Island (KE087-107----), located c. 11.5kms to the NNW, and at Hog’s Head enclosed barracks\signal station (KE105-004----), located c. 10.2kms to the E\ESE. A signal tower\station was planned for Hog Island (Scariff Island) but this may never have been built (Kerrigan 1995, 278). This signal tower site at Bolus Head is located c. 2.3kms W of an ecclesiastical enclosure (KE097-044001- to KE097-044014-) at Cill Rialaigh, and c. 2.5kms S of a coastal promontory fort (KE096-014----) located at Alachaí Mór. An early nineteenth-century (c. 1804-5) originally two-storey square-plan signal tower (ext. dims. c. 6m NE-SW x c. 6m NW-SE) built of randomly coursed rubble stone masonry. The walls of the signal tower face to the NE, SE, SW, and NW. The signal tower is now mostly collapsed, and consists only of a number of short upstanding sections of rubble stone walling that do not extend above the original ground floor level; rubble spreads mainly to the N indicating that the tower collapsed in this direction. It has been suggested that this signal tower pre-dates, and was later serviced by\superseded by, the nearby enclosed barracks\signal station (KE104-001----), located 600m to the E\ESE (Clements 2013, 99). Kerrigan established that this signal tower was almost completed by April 1806 (Kerrigan 1995, 278). It is possible that this signal tower site was never completed, and that the nearby enclosed barracks\signal station superseded it before it was ever in use. The signal tower is shown as a small rectangular-plan building on the Ordnance Survey first ed. six-inch map, surveyed 1841-2, and as a small square-plan building on the Ordnance Survey second and third eds. six-inch maps, surveyed 1894-8 and 1914-5 respectively. There is no indication of any surrounding enclosure indicated on any of the Ordnance Survey maps or on available aerial photographs. The site is connected to a field wall that runs away to the NE that is indicated on the Ordnance Survey second and third eds. six-inch maps, but not on the Ordnance Survey first ed. six-inch map. The signal tower was part of a system of over 80 signal stations constructed by the British Board of Ordnance in the first decade of the nineteenth century to warn of the approach of a French invasion fleet. Signalling between sites was accomplished using a naval signal post. The system formed a continuous chain from Dublin Bay running clockwise all the way around the coast to Malin Head in County Donegal. It was abandoned by the mid-1810s when the threat of a French invasion diminished (Kerrigan 1995, 157-66).