Near this spot, facing Broad Street, stood, in the year 1865, the last remaining fragments of the ruins of the Castle of Kirkwall. A royal fortress of great antiquity and originally of vast strength, but of which from the ravages of war and time nearly every vestige had long previously disappeared. Its remains, consisting of a wall 55 feet long by 11 feet thick and of irregular height, were removed by permission of the Earl of Zetland on application of the trustees acting in execution of the Kirkwall Harbour Act 1859 in order to improve the access to the harbour, and this stone was erected to mark the site. MDCCCLXVI [1866]