The plan is circular with three projecting towers, and the keep
was protected by two circular ditches, one fifteen feet and the other
thirty feet distant from its walls. Between the two ditches was a
circular wall with parapet and battlements. The interior of the castle
was divided into three floors; the towers, exclusive of the turrets,
had five, two of which were entresols, and were ninety-six feet high,
the central keep being seventy feet.[19] The oven was at the top of
the keep. The chapel is one of the most interesting chambers, with its
original altar still in position, though much damaged, and also
piscina, aumbrey, and ciborium. This castle nearly vanished with other
features of vanishing England in the middle of the eighteenth century,
Lord Hereford proposing to pull it down for the sake of the material;
but "it being a necessary sea-mark, especially for ships coming from
Holland, who by steering so as to make the castle cover or hide the
church thereby avoid a dangerous sandbank called the Whiting,
Government interfered and prevented the destruction of the
building."[20]
[19] Cf. _Memorials of Old Suffolk_, p. 65.
[20] Grose's _Antiquities._
In these keeps the thickness of the walls enabled them to contain
chambers, stairs, and passages.
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