Pollock Castle

About

Pollock Castle, also known as Pollok Castle, was a tower house castle located to the west of modern Newton Mearns in East Renfrewshire, on the opposite side of the M77 motorway from the town. The castle appears on Timothy Pont's map (1583–1596), as a castle named Pook and also appears on Joan Blaeu's map of 1654. The castle was rebuilt between 1686 and 1694 by Sir Robert Pollok, 1st Baronet of Pollok, with a new east wing.

Further extensions included an enclosing courtyard with an ornate gateway and formal walled garden with corner pavilions. William Roy's map (1747–1755) shows the castle and landscape in detail. It was destroyed by fire in 1882, but rebuilt afterwards in 1886 in the Scots Baronial Style architecture, incorporating the surviving elements of the earlier structure.

It was requisitioned by the British Army in 1939 during World War II, bar one wing occupied by the Pollok family throughout the war and the lands used as an ammunition dump. In 1944, Miss Fergusson Pollok, the then owner, abandoned the castle and it then deteriorated. It was required to be demolished in 1952.

In 1970, all that remained of the castle were the two gatehouses, the stable, and the gardener's cottage...