Salcombe Castle or Fort Charles is a ruined fortification just off the beach of North Sands in Salcombe, Devon, England, within the South Devon Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. It is located on a rocky outcrop which is easily reached on foot at low tide. It is a Grade II listed building and ancient monument. The ruined structure includes a four-story semicircular tower with gun ports near the top. It is connected by a section of wall to a rectangular tower which is high. History Salcombe Castle, first called ‘the Bulwark’, was originally built between 1535 and 1539 as a gun battery, with seven gun embrasures. It was built by subscription under Lord Viscount Courtenay’s direction for protection against the French raids, not as part of the ‘Kinges Works’ of King Henry VIII, (26 volumes) under which most of the batteries and castles in the South and South West were built. It is thought that its build was overseen by Thomas Treffry of Fowey, who also oversaw several other coastal defences. It was built on a rocky promontory with no easy access, so a causeway stretching around the coast from Salcombe village had first to be constructed, of which signs still remain where they had to cut through various rocks, some still clearly visible, especially where it passes the little Woodcot Folly castle. Since then there is no record of the French attempting another raid there, so it seems to have been a success. During the Civil War, it was twice raided by Parliamentary ships, and even once on July 12th, 1545 surrounded, when the ship the ‘James’ with a force of 200 men, slipped out of Plymouth on an ebb tide and light south-westerly and sailed round to Salcombe where she anchored. The soldiers were disembarked and marched into Salcombe, where an officer called on the Castle to surrender. But when presumably the tide came in, the soldiers were re-embarked and returned to Plymouth, where they arrived on the 15th. In 1646, its Royalist governor, Col. Sir Edmund Fortescue of East Allington, held out for nearly five months when it was besieged by Parliamentary forces under the overall command of Col. Weldon from Plymouth, together with Col. Richard Inglesby, who had brought his regiment, with its three guns, over from besieging Dartmouth. The guns were mounted on the top of Rickham Common, above Sunny Cove. The three emplacements may