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St Mawes Castle was built by Henry VIII in 1540-45 as one of a pair of artillery forts to protect this strategic area from the threat of invasion from Catholic France and Spain. Pendennis Castle was built on the opposite headland and between them their cannon could cover the entire entrance to the Fal estuary.
The castle has a central circular tower with three lower semi-circular bastions that give the castle the appearance of a clover leaf when viewed from above. The main entrance is on the landward side, protected by a rock-cut ditch. Cannon could be mounted on the roof of the main tower and bastions and on floors within the bastions. The defences at St Mawes were designed to counter the threat of an attack from the sea, but overlooked by high ground it was vulnerable to an attack from the land. The more defensible Pendennis Castle became the dominant fortress in the region and as a result St Mawes did not see the major alterations that took place at Pendennis and has retained most of its original Tudor design.
Lokking down to part of the waterfront and one of the beaches in St. Mawes - plenty of people taking advantage of the warm and often sunny weather here!
Built between 1540 and 1543 to provide protection to the large inland expanse of water known as the Carrick Roads, near Falmouth.
St Mawes Castle is an artillery fort constructed by Henry VIII near Falmouth, Cornwall, between 1540 and 1542. It formed part of the King's Device programme to protect against invasion from France and the Holy Roman Empire, and defended the Carrick Roads waterway at the mouth of the River Fa
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We stayed at Stargazers with St Mawes Retreats www.stmawesretreats.co.uk/
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Pendennis Castle, Falmouth, Cornwall.
Grade l listed.
Half Moon Battery.
Originally built in 1793, Half Moon Battery played an important role in the defence of Falmourh.
Pendennis Castle is an artillery fort constructed by King Henry VIII between 1540 and 1542. It formed part of the King's Device programme to protect against invasion from France and the Holy Roman Empire, and defended the Carrick Roads waterway at the mouth of the River Fal. The original, circular keep and gun platform was expanded at the end of the century to cope with the increasing Spanish threat, with a ring of extensive stone ramparts and bastions built around the older castle. Pendennis saw service during the English Civil War, when it was held by the Royalists, and was only taken by Parliament after a long siege in 1646. It survived the interregnum and Charles II renovated the fortress after his restoration to the throne in 1660.
Ongoing concerns about a possible French invasion resulted in Pendennis's defences being modernised and upgraded in the 1730s and again during the 1790s. In the 1880s and 1890s an electrically operated minefield was laid across the River Fal, operated from Pendennis and St Mawes, and new, quick-firing guns were installed to support these defences. The castle saw service during both the First and Second World Wars, but in 1956, by now obsolete, it was decommissioned. It passed into the control of the Ministry of Works, who cleared away many of the more modern military buildings and opened the site to visitors. In the 21st century, the castle is managed by English Heritage.
St Mawes is a small village opposite Falmouth, on the Roseland Peninsula on the south coast of Cornwall, United Kingdom. It lies on the east bank of the Carrick Roads, a large waterway created after the Ice Age from an ancient valley which flooded as the melt waters caused the sea level to rise dramatically. The immense natural harbour created is often claimed to be the third largest in the world. It was once a busy fishing port, but the trade declined during the 20th century and it now serves as a popular tourist location, with many properties in the village functioning as holiday accommodation. The village is in the civil parish of St Just in Roseland.