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SANDGATE CASTLE

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Sandgate Castle was originally built as an artillery castle in 1539-1540 by Henry VIII, as part of his chain of coastal defences in response to the threat of invasion. It was built to defend a vulnerable stretch of coastline and due to its proximity to the French coast the site has been constantly defended and refortified. In 1715-1716 the keep was re-roofed and the seaward battery rebuilt following damage by the spring tides. In 1805-6, during the Napoleonic wars, a major series of alterations were carried out on the castle to convert it into a gun-fort or tower. The tops of the original defensive towers were removed and the central tower converted into a Martello style tower mounting a coastal battery. In the late 1850s a new magazine was built and alterations made to the existing gun emplacements. Pillboxes were constructed at the castle during the Second World War and in the 1950s most of the outer wall on the south side was destroyed by coastal erosion. By 1893, the castle had become a private house and was restored in 1975 under the supervision of the Department of Environment.

Little remains of the original Henrician castle due to the subsequent remodelling that took place but elements are incorporated into the later fortifications. It originally comprised of a large three-storey central tower or keep which was surrounded by two concentric curtain walls. The inner curtain wall had three round towers and the outer curtain wall had a three-storey gatehouse to the north and a rectangular building or "barbican" connecting it to the central tower. All these buildings were originally roofed, and the castle was designed so that it rose progressively from the outside in to provide three or four tiers of heavy guns. These were positioned behind 65 embrasures or gun-ports and there were also gun-loops in the lower levels of the towers and buildings to provide flanking fire.

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(TR 20683517) Castle (NR) (1)

Sandgate Castle, built 1539-40, is now a private house. The tops of the towers were removed in 1805 and the central tower was converted into a Martello tower. Most of the outer wall on the south side was destroyed 1939-45. Scheduled. (2-3)

See GPs. AO/64/12/3-6. (4)

Sandgate Castle, Listed Grade I. In private ownership. Built in 1539-1540 at the same time and as part of the same series of defences as Sandown, Deal and Walmer Castles, but altered again for defence purposes in 1805. It originally comprised of a large central tower surrounded by 3 smaller towers connected with each other by a curtain wall and covered galleries, with an outer curtain wall and gate-tower on the north and a rectangular building connecting the latter to the central tower. In 1805 the tops of the towers were removed (the central tower being converted into a Martello type tower) and the materials used to fill up the space between the inner and outer walls. Most of the outer wall is missing on the south side, presumably destroyed during World War II, and modern pillboxes have been constructed in the place of part of it. AM. (5)

Built in 1539-1540 by Henry VIII. In late Napoleonic times, the original keep was rebuilt, and the outer works converted to form a series of gun emplacements making it a glorified Martello Tower. A new magazine was built in the late 1850s between the gatehouse and keep, and alterations made to the existing gun emplacements. Erosion before the building of the sea wall in the early 1950s accounts for the loss of a third of the original monument. (6)

Henry VIII artillery castle, unusual type, with lobed triangular ward, small triangular inner ward with three towers and a central round tower. Turned into a Martello Tower. Little of the structure remains, but the general plan can be made out. (7)

Sandgate Castle, Castle Road. One of the series of castles built by Henry VIII along the south coast from Kent to Cornwall. What gives Sandgate Castle it special interest is the fact that full building accounts survive. They show that the engineer in charge was a German, Stephan von Haschenpeng. Building operations lasted from March 1539 to October 1540 and cost in all 5,543 pounds 19 shillings and tuppence three farthings. The plan is characteristic of Henry's castles, a series of concentric walls in a complex geometrical shape. In this case the shape is a triangle, with rounded corner projections and convex walls between them. Little of this remains, as in 1806 the central core was converted into a gun-fort, the intermediate ring of walls razed and the outermost walls lowered drastically. It thus became in effect a Martello Tower. The entrance tower on the landward side was not interfered with (sic (20)). This also is quite low, but rendered virtually unassailable by its form, a semicircle, attached by a short passage to the castle itself. The doorway is hidden in the back wall. When entering, one faces nothing but gunports - not however very effective ones, for their splays would not have allowed a wide arc of fire. (8-11)

TR 20653520. Sandgate Castle. This Tudor castle was brought into the South coast tower project by Twiss who proposed throwing bomb-proof arches over some of the towers. 8 x 24 pounder guns were added and the alterations completed in 1806. (12-13)

A royal warrant of 15 February 1584 granted 1,000 pounds to be spent on the defence of the Cinque Ports of which Sandgate received the largest proportion. It was the only coastal fort built by Henry VIII that did not defend a harbour or anchorage, but was built to guard the 'gate' to the Kentish Hinterland. A considerable part of the structure survives, but little of Tudor date is actually visible owing to the drastic remodelling of 1805-1808. Up to 1805 the castle was still essentially a Tudor building, but it had already been modified as early as 1558. During the ensuing two and a half centuries it was repaired on several occasions, notably in 1715-1716 when the keep was reroofed and the whole of the seaward battery rebuilt after being breached by the spring tides.

Originally the castle consisted of a central keep surrounded by two concentric curtains. The outer one encircled a ward or 'barbican' thirty feet wide and the inner curtain was strengthened by three roundtowers around the keep. A fourth wing containing the gatehouse and gate passage ran north across the inner curtain, barbican and outer curtain to join the inner face of the half-moon bastion which enclosed and protected the outer gate. All these buildings were originally roofed, and levels arranged throughout the castle to provide three or possibly four tiers of heavy guns. The keep was built from the original ground surface, the ground floor being buried and the keep entered at first floor level. The wings joining the three round towers to the keep were perhaps the most remarkable single feature of the Sandgate design and cannot be exactly matched in any other castle of the period.

The gatehouse formed a massive front in which was set at first-floor level the castle gate and perhaps portcullis. Sandgate Castle was a centrally planned fortification with three lines of defence-outer curtain, inner curtain, keep, rising in three main tiers towards the centre. It offensive power lay in the heavy guns which could be mounted in over 60 gun-ports at four different levels. For local defence with hand-guns, there were a further 65 loops at four levels. (14)

Sandgate Castle built in 1539, according to the Italian scheme. Deep moating (18) (sic (19)) remains to this day.

The Calendar of State Papers relating to Sandgate Castle survives for the Tudor period. (20) (16-20)

In 1975 the restoration of Sandgate Castle was started by the owners Drs P and B McGregor, under the supervision and with the assistance of the Department of Environment. To achieve this, archaeological investigations including excavations and detailed drawings were undertaken.

In 1881 the site had been sold to the South-Eastern Railway Company for a proposed station at Sandgate Village. By 1893, it passed into private ownership and was occasionally open with its museum to the public. The castle was always entered through the ground floor of the gatehouse, at the rear of the semi-circle. The gatehouse was thought to have survived in its Tudor form, but is now known to have been almost entirely rebuilt from first floor level in 1806. The ground floor is original. The outer curtain wall was largely rebuilt in 1806. The North East Bastion was also reduced to first floor level in 1806 and was capped with a vaulted dome carried on a brick pier.

The keep was transformed into a Martello Tower and was thus in stone, unlike the other Martello towers. It originally was of three stories, plus roof level, but is now of two and the roof. Much of the original Tudor fabric remains. The roof of the keep is entirely a 19th century structure, and it housed two successive gun emplacements. (21)

For further information on this site please refer to the additional bibliography. (22 - 29)

The three-storey keep was surrounded by an inner and outer curtain wall. The inner curtain had three towers and the outer was around a barbican or ward. There was a three-storey gatehouse within a fourth wing. The castle was designed to provide three or four tiers of fire from 65 embrasures or gun-ports with other gun loops in the lowest levels of the curtain walls and towers. (30)

SOURCE TEXT

( 1) Annotated Record Map

OS 25" 1958

( 2) List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest

1118/11/A/ May 1948

( 3) Ministry of Works 1953 Ancient monuments in England and Wales : list prepared by the Ministry of Works, corrected to 31st December 1952

Page(s)59

( 4) Field Investigators Comments

F1 CFW 28.04.64

( 5) List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest

District of Shepway 737/7/20, 05-DEC-1949

( 6) Scheduled Monument Notification

24/Sep/1984

( 7) by David J Cathcart King 1983 Castellarium anglicanum : an index and bibliography of the castles in England, Wales and the islands. Volume I : Anglesey - Montgomery

Page(s)233-4

( 8) by John Newman 1983 North east and east Kent

The Buildings of England Page(s)445

( 9) Kent Archaeological Society Archaeologia Cantiana : being contributions to the history and archaeology of Kent

W L Rutton 20, 1893 Page(s)228-257

(10) Journal of the British Archaeological Association

T H Lewis 40, 1884 Page(s)173-8

(11) Society of Antiquaries of London Archaeologia : or miscellaneous tracts relating to antiquity

B H St J O'Neil 91,1945 Page(s)137-55

(12) Sheila Sutcliffe 1972 Martello towers

Page(s)87

(13) by D Bennett 1977 A handbook of Kent's defences from 1540 until 1945

Page(s)9

(14) by H M Colvin ... [et al] 1982 The history of the King's Works, volume 4 : 1485-1660 (Part 2)

Page(s)370,371,404,569-87

(15) Royal Archaeological Institute The Archaeological Journal

A D Saunders 123, 1966 Page(s)139

(16) by Hugh Braun 1936 The English castle

Page(s)110

(17) edited by A J Taylor 1969 Chateau Gaillard, 3. Conference at Battle, Sussex, 19-24 September 1966

Page(s)142

(18) edited by William Page 1908 The Victoria history of the county of Kent, volume one

The Victoria history of the counties of England Page(s)44

(19) Kent Archaeological Society Archaeologia Cantiana : being contributions to the history and archaeology of Kent

W L Rutton 23, 1898 Page(s)24-30

(20) Kent Archaeological Society Archaeologia Cantiana : being contributions to the history and archaeology of Kent

W L Rutton 21, 1895 Page(s)244-59

(21) Post-medieval archaeology : the journal of the Society for Post-Medieval Archaeology

E C Harris 14, 1980 Page(s)53-88

(22) Francis Grose 1773 The Antiquities of England and Wales

8 Page(s)100-101

(23) JD MACKENZIE 1897 CASTLES OF ENGLAND

1 Page(s)38

(24) Country Life

10 Page(s)32, 238

(25) Country Life

88 Page(s)190-4

(26) General reference

Buck's Antiquities 1 1774 141 (S & N Buck)

(27) General reference

Historical and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent (E Hasted) 3 Page(s)381-382

(28) General reference

Castles and Cannon Study Early Artillery Fortification in Eng 1960 60 (B H St J O'Neil)

(29) B M Morley 1976 Henry VIII and the development of coastal defence

Page(s)28-29

(30) Harrington, Peter 2007 The Castles of Henry VIII

Page(s)21

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