What is recorded here

Mount Long Castle rose in 1631 as John Long’s fortified house, placing three storeys and corner towers beside Oyster Haven Bay before defensive architecture faded. Its owners burned the structure in 1643, leaving behind rubble limestone walls, carved window mouldings and empty loop openings that still cut the rural air. The ruin preserves a sudden violent choice made inside a newly built home, turning domestic ambition into scorched absence.

Freestanding ruinous remains of three-bay three-storey with attic fortified house, built 1631, comprising central square-plan block with corner-sited square-plan towers, two of which (north-west, south-west) have collapsed. Roof missing with pitches evident to gable fronts. Exposed rubble limestone walls having sections of render, dressed limestone quoins and string courses. Square-headed window openings with limestone sills and chamfered surrounds, having carved limestone label mouldings and single, bipartite and multiple-pane windows with tooled limestone mullions and transoms. Defensive loop openings having dressed chamfered limestone surrounds.

A fine example of a seventeenth century fortified house, built at a time when more domestic houses were coming to replace the defensive tower house. Built by John Long, it is thought to have been burnt by its owners only twelve years after its construction, in 1643. Located in a rural setting on the bank of Oyster Haven Bay, this is a very striking feature in the landscape.

This does not grant access. Most recorded buildings are privately owned; view them only from public ground unless the owner allows entry.