A History of Garleton Castle

Sir John Seton built Garleton, Barnes and owned Hailes Castle in East Lothian.  Hailes was reduced to ruins by Cromwell in 1650, and thereby remained as such.  The preceeding photos are all that remain of the castle raised in the late 1500's by Sir John Seton (treasurer of the household and Lord of Session under King James VI of Scots 1567-1625) on land originally owned by the Lyndsay family of nearby Byres castle.  Garleton was built after 1550 and before Sir John Seton's death in 1594. It is now a partially ruined castle on the northern slopes of the Garleton Hills in East Lothian, located at East Garleton, 2 miles (3 km) north of Haddington. Built in the 16th century for the Seton family, on land once owned by the Lindsays, Garleton Castle once comprised three blocks enclosed by a curtain wall. A small section of that wall and parts of one of its round towers survive. One of the blocks was replaced by cottages in the 19th century but to the south is a complete hall-house, featuring crow-stepped gables, a round stair-tower and gun loops. Although much-altered and latterly used as a farm steading, its vaulted basement including two rooms is still extant. These rooms were a kitchen with a wide-arched range and another room featuring a canopied fireplace.

Garleton castle appears to have consisted of three main buildings of mixed rubble construction, a crowstepped gabled hall-house with cannon-loops on the south side,a possible L-plan tower house and a lean-to conical roofed drum tower also with cannon-loops on the north and east corners respectively. All attached together by a roughly oblong plan courtyard wall. The present south wall linking these buildings is obviously modern, lacking cannon-loops, deviating from the logical courtyard plan and hindering the fields of fire for the tower gunners. The west wing is completely obscured by the modern cottages but may well be the site of the courtyard gatehouse with outer bridge spanning that approach. For defensive reasons the entire site would have been surrounded by a deep fortified ditch, thus allowing the castle gunners a clear field of fire in all directions. It is unclear wither these defenses were every put to the test. Certainly the castles of Innerwick, Hailes, Dirleton and Tantallon are all mentioned during Cromwell's sacking of Lothian castles after the defeat of the Scots army at the battle of Dunbar in 1650. His actions may explain the disappearance of Garleton's neighbours of Kilduff tower and Athelstaneford tower.

What is misleading about the castle's location today is it wasn't a lonely tower house. But one in a chain of towers that dotted the valley floor. With Ballencrieff and Byres to the west, to the north sat Kilduff tower, to the east Athelstaneford tower and Markle castle with Barnes castle on the Garleton ridge also built by Sir John but it never got higher than vault level before his death.  It may be that Sir David Lindsay, author of the play Ane Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis, was born in a house on this site in 1486. George Seton, 3rd Earl of Winton (1584 - 1650), gave Garleton Castle to his youngest son, Sir John Seton of Garleton (1639 - 1686). In 1724, the property was sold to James Wemyss, the 5th Earl of Wemyss (1699 - 1756). Subsequently much of the stone was reused to built the farm cottages now occupying the north side of the site.  The presence of the modern cottages on site highlights the common practice of Victorian builders to dismantle such ancient towers as Garleton viewing them as ready made quarries failing to appreciate their historical and architectural value.  Indeed locally the ruin of Barnes is still known as 'the vaults'. Kilduff tower and Athelstaneford tower have no traceable remains though a castle dove-cot is still around in the present village of Athelstaneford.