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Ardfinnan Castle, is a castle built in 1185 with its sister Lismore Castle, by the river crossing at Ardfinnan ( Ard Fhíonáin in Irish) in County Tipperary, Ireland. It is situated on the River Suir, four miles south of Cahir and seven miles west of Clonmel. One of the earliest Anglo-Normans castles in Ireland, Ardfinnan and Lismore represent the oldest castles built by the English Crown in Ireland. The castle and grounds are a private residence and not open for public viewing.
The Anglo-Normans castle is positioned on a large rocky incline above a ford in the river, looking out over the Suir valley with the Knockmealdown Mountains to the south, and the Galtee Mountains to the northwest. The castle is a parallelogram in shape with square battlements at the corners, ruins of a chapel, a circular 13th century keep and a fortified entrance gateway. The full extent of its structure is hidden by the trees of the Castle Wood. The castle is bound at the riverbank, bridge and road by its old watermill.
Numerous raiding parties were launched from the castle into the surrounding north and western territories. In opposition to John's construction of the castles, Lismore Castle was taken by surprise in an attack by the Irish, and its governor, Robert de Barry, was slain along with his entire garrison. King of Munster Donal O'Brien, King of Connacht Rory O'Conner and King of Desmond Dermod MacCarthy, now headed for Ardfinnan. Opposite the imposing castle and on the other side of the river, O'Brien became aware that he would not be able to take it by force. Feinting retreat, he was pursued by the small garrison of knights holding Ardfinnan Castle. Having drawn them out of their stronghold, he swiftly turned back towards Ardfinnan and surrounded the now exposed knights, slaying a large portion of them and subsequently taking Ardfinnan Castle. After this and further successive defeats against the Irish Kings, John's original force of 300 men was decimated and by December of 1185, he was summoned back to England by his father, leaving Hugh de Lacy at Ardfinnan.
The castle under Norman control, the surrounding Cantred of Ardfynan (Ardfinnan) was by 1210 under the lordship of Philip of Worcester, with a permanent presence of the Knights Templar, and later the Knights Hospitaller. While the knights' protected this important pass between the ecclecsiatical centres of Cashel and Lismore, they constructed the castle's surviving circular keep in the early 13th century. A historical tradition of wool spinning and weaving in the cottages surrounding the castle suggests the Knights Templars established a fulling mill to finish locally woven cloth while corn milling on the river bank below the castle. This may have supported earlier traditions brought by the monasteries and even reused a mill race and weir from the former Ardfinnan Abbey on the site. The 13th to 16th century also saw a boom in exports of woollen Irish cloaks to mainland Europe from the port of Waterford, on which border Ardfinnan Castle defended and was directly navigable downstream via the river Suir. 'Dyers' principally ran fulling mills in this era. A Free tenant (skilled artisan) named William le Teynturer ( William the Dyer) is recorded in Ardfinnan in 1295.
Defending the castle from the Roundhead with a small force of soldiers was David Fitzgibbon (the White Knight), Governor of Ardfinnan Castle. The Manor of Ardfinnan was by this time in the possession of the Bishop of Lismore and the Earls of Ormond. With cannons placed on a hill opposite the castle, Ireton bombarded its once impenetrable walls until there was a large breakthrough after about 8 shots and then proceeded to kill about thirteen of the out-guard and lost only two of his men with about ten wounded. After this the castle was promptly surrendered to the New Model Army who would use it as a garrison throughout their time in Ireland. Fitzgibbon was spared his life for his swift surrender of the castle, but subsequently lost his lands at Ardfinnan and was transplanted to Connacht in 1653. Guns, ammunition and other supplies arriving at Youghal would be brought over the river Blackwater at the pass at Cappoquin and then finally over the river Suir at Ardfinnan to reach the rest of the army in Tipperary. With the end of the Cromwellian campaign of Ireland, the departing Parliamentarian troops Slighting Ardfinnan castle which left it partially in ruins. The castle's watermill on the bridge survived and was recorded in the Down Survey 1656-1658.Industrial Ireland 1750-1930: An Archaeology, Colin Rynne, Collins Press, 2006
John Mulcahy, local owner of the underlying Ardfinnan Woollen Mills, purchased the castle in 1921.Death of Mr W.J. Mulcahy". Munster Tribune. 25, March, 1960. p. 5. Further restorations were made by 1929, during which William Mulcahy recovered a Spanish helmet from the castle grounds dating to the 1601 Siege of Kinsale. The latest addition is the three-storey gable-ended wing, likely added during the 1930s.
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