Little Cumbrae Castle

Little Cumbrae Castle, Little Cumbrae, Scotland, was built and used by Scottish noble families and royal visitors during the medieval and early modern periods.

The place name appears in early records as Kumbrey around 1300, as Cumbraye about 1330, and as Litill Comeray in 1515. A hunting lodge or earlier castle may have been established on the island by Walter Stewart, who lived from 1293 to 1326. Kings of the late fourteenth century used the site during hunting expeditions, with Robert II recorded there in 1375 and 1384, and Robert III visiting the location in later years.

In the early sixteenth century the Hunters of Hunterston served for generations as hereditary foresters of the island. In 1515 Hugh, Earl of Eglinton, was appointed keeper of the island for fifteen years. In 1527 Robert Hunter obtained a royal charter for the island, after which the Crown sold the land to the Earl of Eglinton and the family’s rights were confirmed in 1555 by James V. The present small square tower house is described as having been constructed by Lord Eglinton in the sixteenth century, possibly to control poaching of deer and rabbits. In 1568 a glasswright named George Elphinstoun was employed to fit glass windows into the castle.

At the end of the sixteenth century Robert Boyd lived in the castle and sought to lay out a harbour in 1599. Local opposition led to the destruction of materials intended for the harbour and resulted in Boyd’s removal by members of the Montgomery family. During the mid seventeenth century the Earl strengthened the island’s defences and dispatched his wife with a garrison of forty men to the fortlet. In 1651 Charles II authorised that the forty men maintained by Lord Montgomerie on the isle be allowed to him. Contemporary reports record that Cromwellian forces took the castle by surprise and destroyed it, and one account gives the burning of the structure as occurring in 1653. After that action the castle appears not to have been restored or regularly occupied.

An episode of private justice is recorded when Archibald Hamilton was confined in the castle dungeon by the sixth Earl of Eglinton before being taken to Stirling and hanged. In later centuries the island served as a fenced hunting ground. The sixth Earl may have introduced deer from Ireland, and in the 1850s the fifteenth Earl, George Montgomerie, reintroduced rabbits. About 5,000 rabbits were bred annually and the island was rented to shooting parties. The site now carries legal protection as a scheduled monument, and sources record it as having been listed as Category A at one time, with one account noting Category A listing in 1971 that was withdrawn in 2018 while the site remained scheduled since 1962.