Merrion Castle
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Merrion Castle was a castle situated about 300m south of the present-day Merrion Gates, to the south of Dublin city centre. Built in the early fourteenth century, it was from the sixteenth century to the early eighteenth century the principal seat of the Fitzwilliam family, who acquired the title Viscount Fitzwilliam. After the Fitzwiliams moved to Mount Merrion House in about 1710 the castle fell into ruin, and it was demolished in 1780, though there were remains visible as late as 1837. No trace of Merrion Castle survives today. It was located opposite Merrion Gates, on the site of St. Mary's Home and School for the Blind. Its location, and the modern site of St.Mary's, can be seen on historical maps, including the six-inch (1829-1841) Ordnance Survey of Ireland maps.[1]
The first mention of a castle at Merrion is in about 1334, when the property was in the possession of Thomas Bagod, who was probably a grandson of that Sir Robert Bagod who had built Baggotrath Castle about 1280.[2] In about 1366 Merrion came into the possession of Sir John Cruys or Cruise, a leading landowner, diplomat and soldier, who died in 1407. It is generally said that he built the first permanent structure on the site. In the fifteenth century both castles came into the possession of the Fitzwilliam family, who over the years became the most substantial landowners in Dublin; James Fitzwilliam, the Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer, married Sir John Cruise's daughter. Until the late sixteenth-century Baggotrath was the Fitzwilliams' most favoured residence, for possession of which they fought a bitter private war with the Cornwalsh family in the 1440s, and were even prepared to resort to murder to assert their rights. It was Sir Thomas Fitzwilliam, grandfather of the first Viscount, who in the reign of Elizabeth I made Merrion Castle the principal family residence.[2]
