platform or battery, which also commanded the harbour. It is said the promontory once extended further into the sea, and being covered with soft grass was called the “Green Quay.”
In 1215 the King commanded Roger Pipard to deliver up the castle to any one the Archbishop of Dublin appointed to receive it. Richard de Burgh was ordered to give up the fortress to Geoffrey de Mariscis in 1216 or 1217, but this order was immediately followed by a similar one to William de Lacy, who had evidently taken the King’s Castle at Carlingford.
In 1388 Stephen Gernon, the constable of the time, was licensed by the King to take corn tithes in the lordship of Cooley to supply the castles of Carlingford and Greencastle. Five years later Esmond de Loundres was appointed Warden of Carlingford, Greencastle, and Coly, with the profits due to the office. The O’Neill of that day so pillaged the country round that De Loundres was unable even to meet his expenses, and he petitioned that, the seignory being laid waste, he might be either relieved of office or properly supplied with means to meet the charges attached to it. Whereupon an order to provision the castles under his command was issued.
Fishing rights seem to have been attached to the castle in 1425, and more than a hundred years later they still formed a Government revenue. In 1535 the Treasurer went to Carlingford to inspect the King’s castle. He reported that it and Greencastle with the country round had been almost destroyed, and that if the war was to continue English workmen would have to be sent over to put the castle in repair. He suggested that the expenses should be defrayed by the fishing dues.
This does not seem to have been done, for in 1549 both castles were in a dilapidated condition. Three years later Sir Nicholas Bagenall was granted “the Manor of Carlingford and an old castle there, and the whole demesne and manor of Mourne and Greencastle, the castle and demesne of the Black Friars in Carlingford.” Ten years later it was still in his hands.
In 1596 the Earl of Tyrone, after having pretended to submit to the Government, made an incursion into the Pale. It seems that his foremost troops were commanded by his son-in-law, Henry Oge, who endeavoured to surprise the castle at Carlingford. This he was unable to accomplish, but, “missing of his principal purpose, there were carried away as prisoners, in lamentable manner, two gentlewomen, daughters of Captain Henshaw, the one married and the other a maid.”
The Earl, who was following, had intended to reinforce the troops after the seizing of the town and fortress, but the failure of the enterprise prevented his doing so. He acknowledged having carried off the ladies from the castle “in time of peace,” and refused to return them until O’Hanlon’s son was liberated in exchange.
Marmaduke Whitechurch was constable of Carlingford in 1610, and had six warders under his command.