Local lore places the castle site about 300 metres east of Waterloo Tower, close to the shoreline, but centuries of change have erased any visible remains. The castle appears to have met a practical fate common to many Irish fortifications; its stones were recycled for newer buildings.

Waterloo Tower itself is said to have been constructed using materials salvaged from the old castle, according to research by Healy in 1988. This type of architectural recycling was standard practice in Ireland, where abandoned castles became convenient quarries for local building projects. The tower now stands as an indirect monument to the vanished fortress, its walls potentially containing the very stones that once formed medieval battlements.

While the castle at Belgrove has disappeared from the landscape, its inclusion in the Down Survey provides valuable historical evidence of its existence. This comprehensive mapping project, undertaken during the Cromwellian period, documented landownership and structures across Ireland with remarkable detail. The survey’s record of the castle, combined with persistent local tradition about its location and eventual dismantling, helps piece together the story of this lost Cork fortification, even though the site itself now shows no trace of its former strategic importance.