Dover Castle Part 4
From Atop Fitzwilliam Gate
This is the view looking in the opposite direction of the second picture of this section. The Bell Battery is east of the Norfolk Towers and was constructed in 1756. It connects the Inner Bailey Wall on the right half of the picture with the outer wall on the left near Pencester Tower. As we will see next, the outer wall shifts uphill and to the right from Avranches Tower to Pencester Tower.
View From The East
This is the view from the east toward the castle - the most likely to be approached by the enemy. The gate near the Norfolk Towers was replaced not only by the Constable's Gate, but also by the Fitzwilliam Gate, which was built in the 1220s. It is thought that the Avranches Tower, and the wall which extends uphill from it to Pencester Tower, cover a former entrance into the old Iron Age fort the castle is built over. This area has a high concentration of arrow loops, some of which you can see in the picture above as well as modern scaffolding. (It seems like November is maintenance month in Britain.) The wall was modified in the late eighteenth century for infantry fire from the top and artillery fire from casemates below.
South of the area we have seen so far and between the inner bailey walls (of which the Palace Gate is part), and the outer walls - another line of walls was constructed splitting the castle roughly in half. Colton's Gate is a part of what remains of these walls which were largely eliminated in the Georgian rebuilding. The prominent building between the Palace Gate and Colton's Gate is a Victorian barracks. To the left of the barracks is a well house dating to 1795.