Branksea Castle

Branksea Castle was originally a Device Fort constructed by Henry VIII between 1545 and 1547 to protect Poole Harbour in Dorset, England, from the threat of French attack. Located on Branksea Island, it comprised a stone blockhouse with a hexagonal gun platform. It was garrisoned by the local town with six soldiers and armed with eight artillery pieces. The castle remained in use after the original invasion scare had passed and was occupied by Parliament during the English Civil War of the 1640s. By the end of the century, however, it had fallen into disuse.

In 1726 the castle was converted into a private residence by the new Earl of Branksea. It passed to his son, and then to his second son who (childless and certain that he would ever be so due to an unspeakable war injury), broke the entail and left it to the grandson of his wife, the Dowager Duchess of Pevensey, Eleanor Osgood-Lockhart. Eleanor resides there to this day.

Arthur Osgood spent his childhood years at Branksea, leaving to go to Oxford and then returning to Pevensey Castle on the event of his marriage in 1787. After the death of his wife in 1798 he returned to the island with his four children in tow, and they have remained there ever since.