Bothal Castle

Bothal Castle was an important castle sited upon a rocky outcrop overlooking the River Wanbeck, which is obliged to take two sharp turns in its course here. The castle is a private residence and not open to the public, and it was greatly restored with substantial new additions in the 19th century. The gatehouse is the oldest part which still stands, and dates to the mid 14th century. The buildings can be seen from the public right of way adjacent, but there is no vehicular access, and it cannot be seen from the public roads.

The lands of Bothal were granted to Guy de Balliol by King William II in 1095, and the property passed to the Bertram family as the dowry of Guy’s daughter Alice to William Bertram. In 1166, Bothal was in the hands of his fourth son, Richard, and in 1200 of Richard’s son Robert. Another Richard and two more Roberts followed, the latter named baron of Bothal in 1294, and then a Roger and two more Roberts, the last of whom died in 1363. His heiress daughter had Helen/Eleanor Bertram married Sir Robert Ogle of Mitford. As a secondary property of the Ogles, one might expect Bothal to have been neglected, but instead (and probably the result of ongoing warfare with the Scots, Sir Robert Ogle was granted a license to crenellate the property in 1343, and he fought the Scots at Neville’s Cross in 1346, capturing Malcolm Fleming of Biggar. He then allowed Fleming to escape, leading to his arrest warrant for “contempt” being issued in 1347!

The gatehouse of the castle, now fully restored, is consistent with a mid 14th century date, and is the principal survivor from the medieval period, with a central square structure and two angled towers flanking the entrance. At about this time, the great hall was enlarged, the curtain wall strengthened, and two mural towers were added at the SW and SE corners of the courtyard wall. Towards the end of the 14th century, a tower was added to the NW corner, known as the Blanche Tower, and an outer courtyard known as the Yethouse Court (yett being a wrought iron gate) with another tower at the NW corner. This outer courtyard is considered most likely to postdate the Wars of the Roses. This was illustrated by the Buck brothers in 1728, a copy of which is used as the image to illustrate this article. To the rear, the stone walls which enclosed a lengthy courtyard may have formed the main artificial defence of the castle from the 12th century, although they are undated at present. Sir Robert was succeeded by his grandson, another Sir Robert, in 1363, who granted Bothal to his younger son John, a source of family conflict in 1410 when this second Sir Robert died. John’s elder brother seized Bothal with 200 men after a siege of four days by the use of ladders to scale the walls – until the king told him to give it back. The castle was still inhabited when inspected in 1583, and in 1617 when King James VI of Scotland and I of England stayed here for two nights. By the mid 17th century the castle was held by the Cavendish family, and there is evidence that Sir William Cavendish installed his family here during the Civil War, but after this the castle was abandoned and fell into disrepair, with the restoration taking place from 1830 onwards.