SD3275 : Chapel IslandChapel Island or HartsideThe island was anciently known as Hartside, and is first referred to as Chapel Island in 1795. The original medieval chapel was built by the Augustinian priors of Conishead in
SD3075 for the benefit of travellers crossing the treacherous sands between Ulverston and Flookburgh.
Thomas West in "Antiquities of Furness" (1774) mentions the shell of the chapel as still standing but ruinous. It seems to have been incorporated into a picturesque group of artificial ruins, comprising a high gabled wall of slate pierced by three lancet windows with a circular opening near the apex and constructed by Lt-Colonel Thomas Richmond-Gale-Braddyll of Conishead Priory in 1823. The buildings include a kitchen to the east, another room with a dormitory loft to the west with the remains of a scullery, and a detached outbuilding on the south which may be what is left of the chapel. The walls are 2-3 feet thick, and roughly built of limestone set in mortar.