Rougemont Castle - The Siege of 1136 and After

The Siege of 1136 and After

In 1136, Baldwin de Redvers seized the castle as part of his rebellion against King Stephen. Although Stephen's army moved quickly to besiege the castle, Redvers was able to resist for three months until the failure of his water supply, which had been provided by a well and probably a rainwater cistern. It is possible that the absence of an eastern tower to match Athelstan's Tower is due to its destruction by undermining during this siege, and the discovery in c.1930 of a short section of crudely-built tunnel leading towards this point of the wall has been interpreted as associated with this event. It is also likely that the barbican was captured and destroyed at this time.

On a hill just to the north of the castle lies a small circular earthwork. It is known today as "Danes Castle", but from the 12th century until the 16th it was called "New Castle". It was thought to be an outwork of Rougemont Castle, built to defend its northern side, but following excavation in 1992 it is now believed to have been built by Stephen during his siege.

After Stephen's attack it appears that the advancing technology of siege engines prompted the construction in the late 12th century of an outer bailey. This consisted of a wall with an outer ditch which ran from the eastern city wall on the north side of Bailey Street—where the only remaining section of its wall survives—to the western city wall near today's city museum, where portions of the infilled ditch were discovered during renovation works in 2009.

"Richmond! When last I was at Exeter,
The mayor in courtesy show'd me the castle,
And call'd it Rougemont: at which name I started,
Because a bard of Ireland told me once
I should not live long after I saw Richmond."

The castle continued to be repaired at intervals until the early 14th century; the last recorded repair to the defences being in 1352. By c.1500 the original gateway was out of use, and its entrance blocked up, in favour of an adjacent archway. In the northernmost corner of the castle there was a sally port beneath a large tower and a drawbridge over the ditch outside the wall. These were destroyed in 1774 and no trace now remains.

Although it has always officially been called "Exeter Castle", the more common name of "Rougemont Castle" first appeared in a local record dated around 1250. It refers to the red colour of the rock on the hill and the colour of the walls built from these rocks. King Richard III visited Exeter in 1483 and in Shakespeare's Richard III, the bard makes him later recall a premonition of his death when he is shown the castle and confuses Rougemont with Richmond. The castle was said to have been badly damaged during the Second Cornish Uprising of 1497 when Perkin Warbeck and 6,000 Cornishmen entered the city, and by 1600 it was said to display "gaping chinks and an aged countenance."