Dunboy

Dunboy Castle guarded the harbour of Bearhaven on the rugged Beara peninsula. It was the principal stronghold of the O'Sullivan Beare family, whose lordship extended over Beara and Bantry. The sheltered waters made the castle important to seaborne traffic and to the Gaelic lord's connections with allies overseas.

During the Nine Years' War Donal Cam O'Sullivan Beare supported the Spanish intervention in Ireland and gave a Spanish garrison shelter at Dunboy in 1601. After the defeat at Kinsale, he refused to surrender the castle. Sir George Carew besieged it in June 1602; its defenders resisted fiercely, but the stronghold fell and surviving members of the garrison were executed. O'Sullivan continued to resist before leading his followers on a desperate northward march in the winter that followed.