The Knights of Glin Traditional Cache

This walk runs from St Paul's Heritage Centre to the highest point of the Glin Demesne, where a raised platform provides a panoramic view. It includes a variety of terrain from woodland to farmland and is waymarked with red arrows on a black background. The climb is about 60 Metres and will take well under two hours, good walking boots recommended and though not suitable for buggies, it is great for all ages.

The Knight of Glin , also known as the Black Knight, or Knight of the Valley was a hereditary title in the FitzGerald families of County Limerick since the early 14th century. Sir John Fitz-John, Knight, was the first Knight of Glin, and had from his father the castles of Glincarbery and Castle Beagh, County Limerick, Ireland

The family was a branch of the FitzGerald dynasty, or Geraldines, related to the Earls of Desmond who were questionably granted extensive lands in County Limerick by the Duke of Normandy by way of conquest. The title was named after the village of Glin near the Knight's lands.

According to legend, in the early 16th century under Elizabeth I of England, set about enforcing loyalty in the western parts of Ireland. When one of her ships came up to the Knight of Glin's castle on the Shannon Estuary, a fierce battle ensued. The ship's captain managed to capture one of the Knight's sons and sent the Knight a message that he should surrender or else the son would be put in one of the ship's cannons and fired against the castle wall. He replied that as he was virile and his wife was strong, it would be easy to produce another son. Though history can be vague and tradition can be a completely distorted mirror, the popular memory of a local event such as a battle, siege or massacre can be very vivid

The "Old Castle" of Glin, the scene of the above battle, is a ruin. The tower still stands with a historic plaque in place. After the destruction of the old castle, the Knights built the "New Castle", a beautiful Georgian mansion on the banks of the Estuary about a mile west of the old site and still stands today, the last Knight lived there until his death in 2011.

Under the Penal Laws of the 18th century, the Knights converted to the Church of Ireland to preserve their property. The surrounding villagers remained Roman Catholics, a division indicated today by the two churches in the village of Glin.

Following the war of independence and during the ensuing Civil War, in the early 1920s, Irish Republican Army (IRA) soldiers, from nearby North Kerry came to the 27th Knight Desmond FitzJohn Lloyd FitzGerald to tell him that no one whose title to land came from the English Crown could keep their land. The Knight immediately produced a document in Latin, supposedly from the Duke of Normandy, indicating that his title did not originate from the English Crown at all. The baffled IRA men left the Knight with his properties, which he holds to this day.

This cache marks the beginning of the Knight of Glin Heritage Walk in memory of the Knights of Glin and in particular the 29^th and last Knight of Glin Desmond FitzGerald

Since he had no male heir, the title Knight of Glin became dormant or extinct, making him the last Knight of Glin. I place this and the other caches in memory of such a grand lineage.