CARLOW CASTLE.
Carlow Castle was at this time the centre of government. The courts were held in the hall mentioned, and the Exchequer House was probably situated in one of the towers. The income of the lordship was £750 a year.
After all this expenditure, however, when the Earl’s possessions passed to the Crown in 1306, the castle and hall were so ruined that no value was placed upon them.
J. de Bonevill, of his Majesty’s Castle of Carlow, was appointed seneschal of Carlow and Kildare in 1310 to put down the robberies and outrages in the country.
It is stated that the castle was seized in 1397 by Donald MacArt Kavanagh, the MacMorrough, but the authority is not considered very reliable.
In 1494 James Fitzgerald, brother to the Earl of Kildare, having gone into rebellion, seized the castle and hoisted his standard on its battlements. Sir Edward Poynings marched to Carlow, and after a siege of ten days recovered the fortress.
Carlow Castle was in the hands of Thomas, 10th Earl of Kildare, better known as the “Silken Thomas,” during his rebellion in 1535. After his imprisonment in 1537 Lord (James) Butler, eldest son of the Earl of Ossory, appealed to the Crown for compensation for having defended the Castles of Carlow and Kilkea, “standing on the marches,” close to Irish territory. He was granted his expenses, and appointed constable of both castles.
At the same time the Deputy wrote to the Lord Privy Seal advising him to let the King keep the “manors of Carlagh, Kylea, and Castledermont” in his hands to prevent Lord Ossory and his son from becoming too powerful.
Sir Robert Hartpole applied for the custodianship of the fortress in 1567, it being at that time in possession of Frances Randall, widow of its late keeper.
Rory Oge O’More, Chieftain of Leix, burned the town and Sir Robert Hartpole made a sally from the castle with fifty men and released Harrington and Cosby, who were his prisoners, but O’More escaped in the dark.