According to the Civil Survey of 1654-6, this tower house was owned by Nicholas Power of Rathgormuck in 1641, though he had leased it to another William Power by the time of the survey. The document refers to the site as a “castle and bawn at Monadiha”, using an alternative name for Rathgormuck that hints at the layered history of place names in this part of Ireland.

The mention of a bawn; a defensive wall that typically enclosed a courtyard adjacent to tower houses; raises intriguing questions about the original extent of the fortification. While the Civil Survey clearly states that a bawn existed here, no obvious traces of such a structure survive today. Archaeological investigations have identified a separate structure on the site (catalogued as WA003-039002-), which some researchers suggest might have served as a corner tower of the now vanished bawn, though this remains speculative.

The Power family’s dominance in this area reflects broader patterns of Norman and Old English settlement in County Waterford, where families like the Powers established networks of fortified houses throughout the countryside. The fact that both the owner and tenant shared the Power surname in 1641 suggests the kind of kinship networks that often underpinned land arrangements in early modern Ireland, with properties frequently leased within extended family groups to maintain control over strategic locations.