Hurst Castle - History

History

Hurst Castle is a fort consisting of a circular stone tower strengthened by semicircular bastions of later dates. It was erected by Henry VIII to defend the approach to Southampton Water against the French. The reconmendation that a castle be built on Hurst Point was made in 1539 by William FitzWilliam, 1st Earl of Southampton and William Paulet, 1st Marquess of Winchester. By 1540 some kind of fortification existed but details are scant. The work on the castle proper took several years and was finished by the end of 1544. The first captain of the castle was Thomas Bertie. In 1561 Thomas Carew was captain. The establishment at that time consisted of the captain, his deputy, porter and a master gunner, a "deputy's man," eight soldiers, another for the porter and eleven gunners. Thomas Carew was succeeded on his death by Sir Thomas Gorges, who in 1593 petitioned for the repair of the platforms, which were so decayed as to be incapable of supporting the guns. Sir Edward Gorges, afterwards Baron Gorges of Dundalk, succeeded his father as captain in 1610. The castle seems to have continued in a somewhat inefficient state, and in 1628 when the porter was ordered to stay a ship, though he was "very willing" he "had neither powder nor shot to do it with, and of his twenty-seven pieces of ordnance not above four or five would do any service, and they but for a shot or two." In 1635 most of the bronze ordnance in the castle was exchanged for iron. At the beginning of the English Civil War in 1642, the castle was occupied, in the absence of the captain, by Captain Richard Swanley on behalf of the Parliamentary forces. It was the last prison of Charles I before being moved to Windsor prior to his trial; he was brought here on the last day of November 1648 from Newport. Lord Gorges was succeeded in the captaincy by Colonel Thomas Eyre, who in 1650 secured a grant of further ordnance and an increase in the number of soldiers stationed there.

In the year following the Restoration Colonel Eyre lost his post, and Edward Strange was appointed captain, the office of governor being allowed to lapse. In January 1661 Charles II ordered the garrison to be disbanded and an estimate made of the expense of demolishing the castle; the latter idea was, however, speedily dropped, and five months later, although the forces were paid off, arrangements were made for additions involving an increase in the annual expenditure. In 1666 it was decided that the castle should be garrisoned by men from Sir Robert Holmes' company on the Isle of Wight. This was not done until 1671 owing to the state of disrepair in which the castle was. Sir Robert, who was governor of the Island, reported that there was scarcely a gun mounted and no stores or provisions in the castle; nothing, however, was done, and three years later he wrote complaining that there was hardly a room not fallen in and into which the rain did not come. Repairs were then taken in hand and the garrison established, Captain Strange becoming governor. In 1675 a master gunner and three other gunners were added to the establishment, there being then nearly thirty guns mounted at the castle. In the same year Sir John Holmes petitioned for leave to purchase the governorship, and this being granted him he was appointed to the post. Captain Roach, who was captain of the castle at this time, having murdered a certain Lieutenant Newman, fled to Yarmouth, and borrowing a black cloak took boat to Hurst, where he was arrested. In 1689 Henry Holmes was appointed to the captaincy.