The land here was granted by Henry II to the Knights Templar sometime before 1180, though local tradition suggests the tower house itself was built by the le Poer family of Curraghmore. When Pope Clement V suppressed the Templars around 1308, the property briefly passed to their rivals, the Knights Hospitallers of Killure, before eventually being dissolved during the Reformation. What followed was a dizzying succession of owners: William Wyse, Robert Woodford, Anthony Power, and then jointly held by Sir John King and Adam Loftus, until the Aylward family acquired it shortly after 1615. They managed to hold onto it until Cromwell's forces arrived, after which it was rather oddly assigned to Duncannon fort across the water in County Wexford.

Today, only the southeast corner of the tower house survives, featuring cut-stone quoins, a base batter, and three openings that once served a now-destroyed mural staircase. When antiquarian John O'Donovan visited around 1840, he recorded considerably more: the south and west walls still stood about 8 metres high, forming a rectangular structure measuring roughly 13.2 metres east to west and 9.5 metres north to south. At that time, you could still see evidence of a doorway in the east wall, mural stairs in both the east and south walls leading to the first floor, and remnants of a barrel vault that once supported the upper levels.

The tower house doesn't stand alone in its field; about 70 metres to the north you'll find Crooke church, another medieval ruin, whilst the surrounding fields contain faint traces of old field boundaries covering roughly two hectares, suggesting this was once the centre of a more substantial settlement. The site has been recognised as nationally important and is protected under a preservation order since 1976, ensuring these fragments of Ireland's complex medieval past remain for future generations to explore.