The castle rises from the western edge of a narrow and deep ravine, which conveys a streamlet from Fonmon village into the Kenson.
On its north front, but at some little distance from the castle, a similar steep bank slopes down direct to the Kenson, which there traverses a meadow, in earlier days probably an impassable morass. On its west and south sides the castle stands on table land, and was covered, no doubt, by a moat and outer wall. The keep, a rectangular building 45 feet high, and 25 feet north and south, by 43 feet east and west, including its walls, which are 5 feet thick, appears to be late Norman, and may be presumed to be Sir John de St. John’s work. Additions, probably of early English and early Decorated date, enclose it on the north, east, and partially on the south sides; on the latter forming a considerable wing, a part of which is a square tower which caps the south-east angle, and is a principal feature in the general view of the building. Two bow towers of the same date project from the east front. The principal additions on the north are of the seventeenth century, and were erected without reference to defence.
The outworks, with the exception of one tower which stands alone on the south-eastern front, about 140 yards from the castle, long since have given way to stabling, barns, and formal terraced gardens, most of which have in their turn disappeared. The remaining tower seems to have been the south-eastern termination of the defences of the outer court.
The St. Johns resided, more or less, at Fonmon until towards the fourteenth century, when, by intermarriage with the heiresses of Paveley, Pawlet, and, finally, of Beauchamp of Bletsoe, they became powerful English lords, and removed their head-quarters into Bedfordshire. Fonmon was probably left to the care of a bailiff, though some cadets of the family settled at Highlight, and there remained after the sale of the property to Colonel Jones, about 1655. Since that period it has been regularly inhabited by the Jones family, as it now is by their descendant and representative, Robert Oliver Jones, Esq.
The castle contains portraits of Cromwell and Ireton, and a fine one of Mr Robert Jones, grandfather of the present proprietor, by Reynolds.
FOTHERINGAY CASTLE, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE.
THE masonry of this castle has been entirely removed, but the original moated mound and earth-banks remain, and the lines of the masonry may be traced by the trenches dug when the foundations were grubbed up. The mound stands on the left bank of the river Nene, and of the buildings the principal, disposed nearly east and west, was very evidently the great hall in which Mary of Scotland was tried and executed.
There is in “Ellis’s Letters” (First Series, Vol. II.) a draught plan, in Burghley’s hand, of the hall as it was ordered to be prepared for the trial.
The “great chamber” was 23 yards long with the window, and 7 yards broad. The length without the window was 21 yards. The window, therefore, was probably a bay or oriel, of 6 feet projection within. The draught plan was sent down with the figures blank to be filled in by special measurement.