Qualla: Belvelly Castle

Belvelly Castle: Introduction

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit DeFacto, CC BY-SA 4.0. During the First World War, Cork coachmen made good money driving American and British sailors out to a small grey tower house overlooking a bridge, telling them - and possibly half-believing it themselves - that they had arrived at Blarney Castle. The sailors kissed the wrong stones. They had been taken to Belvelly, not Blarney. The trick speaks to how easily one Irish castle can be sold as another, but it also tells you something about Belvelly's location: right beside the only road bridge connecting Fota Island to Great Island, impossible to miss, and convenient for a coachman with a story to tell.

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Image: DeFacto | CC BY-SA 4.0

Belvelly Castle: A Hodnett Fortification

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Philip Halling, CC BY-SA 2.0. Belvelly was built in the 14th or 15th century by the Anglo-Norman Hodnett family, one of the smaller settler clans who took up positions around Cork Harbour after the conquest. The Hodnetts later leased the lands back, an arrangement that became common as Norman families interma...

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Image: Philip Halling | CC BY-SA 2.0

Belvelly Castle: Raleigh, Cromwell, and the Long 17th Century

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit User: (WT-shared) Spircle at wts wikivoyage, CC BY-SA 4.0. Some sources place Walter Raleigh at Belvelly in the 16th century - the same Raleigh who tormented the Barrys at Barryscourt during the Desmond Rebellions. The castle later passed back to the De Barra family, the Norman dynasty that dominated this part of East Cork. During the Ir...

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Image: User: (WT-shared) Spircle at wts wikivoyage | CC BY-SA 4.0

Belvelly Castle: The Sailors Who Kissed the Wrong Stone

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit psyberartist, CC BY 2.0. By the 19th century Belvelly was a ruin, mossy and forgotten. Then came the First World War, and Queenstown - now Cobh - became a major Allied naval port. The harbour filled with American destroyers, British cruisers, and exhausted sailors with shore leave. Local coachmen spotted...

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Image: psyberartist | CC BY 2.0

Belvelly Castle: From Emergency Outpost to Restoration

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit DeFacto, CC BY-SA 4.0. During the Emergency - Ireland's name for the Second World War, which it spent officially neutral - the Irish Army occupied and modified Belvelly. The castle slipped back into disuse afterwards. By the early 21st century it was again a ruin, and in 2016 planning permission was gr...

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Image: DeFacto | CC BY-SA 4.0