Moorstown Castle — Moorstown (inishlounaght Par.)

On a natural limestone outcrop in the NW sector of the bawn (TS076-039002-). According to the Ormond Deeds, James Keating of Moortowne is a signatory to a petition to Henry VIII in 1542 (Curtis 1937, 215). In 1640 'Robt Cox of Broff in the Con: of Limericke Esqr English Protestt. [was] Proprietor in Mortgage of ...Moorestowne-keatinge...the condition of redemption in Richard Keatinge of Moorestowne aforesd, the Inheritor of the sd lands. Upon the sd lands of Moorestowne-Keatinge stands a castle and a Bawne about it, the walls of a little castle over the gate of the sd bawne' (Simington 1931, vol. 1, 311). According to the I.T.A. Survey (1942) 'Richard Keating ..was deprived of his property at the time of the Cromwellian confiscations. Its next owner was a puritan named Godfrey Greene'. This circular four-storey towerhouse (dia. 10.58m N-S) is constructed of limestone rubble, randomly coursed, with external base-batter. The main chamber, at both first and second-floor level, is circular, while the inaccessible third floor is described as being almost square in plan (Wallace 1989, 18). The entrance is in the S face and only accessed from external steps, all of which are broken out. According to the OS Letters sixteen stone steps led up to the entrance (O'Flanagan 1930, vol. 1, 42). The pointed doorway has a yett-hole at the apex and on either side. This leads into an entrance lobby (dims. 1.2m x 1.5m) with murder-hole overhead and embrasure opposite with ope broken out, though it probably contained a cross-loop. At the N end of the E wall of the lobby is a narrow, flat-headed doorway which leads into a guard room with yett embrasure on the S side. In the wall opposite the doorway is a large, deep wall cupboard and at the N end of the E wall is a gun-loop, slightly broken out, providing covering fire for the entrance gateway. The third doorway in the lobby is a wide, pointed doorway with remains of an iron hinge on the E internal rebate. It leads, via a step down, into the main ground-floor chamber (int. dims. 5.15m N-S; 5.1m E-W; N wall T 2.83m). It was lit by two round-headed single-light windows at NE and NW, both with gun-loop embrasures on either side. There is a large wall cupboard in the W wall. The first floor was carried on wooden beams. It was entered from the spiral stairs in the SW sector. This floor was lit by two windows in the N and SE, both with gun-embrasures similar to the ground-floor arrangement. The first floor has a dome-vaulted ceiling with wicker-centring. The spiral stairs has been partially broken out up to first-floor level and beyond there are no steps as these were removed by the local unit of the IRA between 1918 and 1922 when, having erected a tricolour on the parapet, they tried to ensure that the Crown forces could not easily remove it (Wallace 1989, 19). The second-floor chamber has a fireplace with a flat lintel and chamfered rounded edges (ibid.). At both second and third-floor level a mural passage is accessed from a flat-headed doorway in the spiral stairs in NW, probably garderobe chambers as the garderobe chute exits at the base of the tower house in the NW sector. The second floor appears to have been used as a dovecot, probably in the 18th or 19th century. In the NE and SW the curving roof-line of the gable rises on the outer wall, with a chimney at the apex at NE. At parapet level there are two machicolations, at SE and NW, the former ivy covered, while shot-holes are visible in the later. In the W sector of the external face at first-floor level the render projects out, possibly indicating the remains of a later structure up against the tower house. Compiled by: Jean Farrelly Date of revised upload: 24 September 2014