Fenwick Tower was a 12th century tower house

Tower house

A tower house is a particular type of stone structure, built for defensive purposes as well as habitation.-History:Tower houses began to appear in the Middle Ages, especially in mountain or limited access areas, in order to command and defend strategic points with reduced forces...

 at Matfen

Matfen

Matfen is a village and a civil parish in Northumberland, England, near the towns of Hexham and Newcastle upon Tyne. It is an example of an eighteenth-century planned estate village. It was the birthplace of the nineteenth-century Premier of British Columbia, William Smithe...

, Northumberland

Northumberland

Northumberland is the northernmost ceremonial county and a unitary district in North East England. For Eurostat purposes Northumberland is a NUTS 3 region and is one of three boroughs or unitary districts that comprise the "Northumberland and Tyne and Wear" NUTS 2 region...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

.

The house was the home of the Fenwick family from the 12th century until they moved to Wallington

Wallington Hall

Wallington is a country house and gardens located about west of Morpeth, Northumberland, England, near the village of Cambo. It has been owned by the National Trust since 1942, after it was donated by Sir Charles Philips Trevelyan, the first donation of its kind...

 in the 16th century.

In 1378 John Fenwick was granted a licence to crenelate the house. The tower was largely demolished in about 1775 at which time a hoard of medieval gold coins was discovered.

The sparse remains of the tower are now incorporated into a 17th century farmhouse and are protected by Grade II listed building status