Much of the success of the MacCarthy clan over the centuries was down to their judgement of who best to support in times of conflict.

Sometimes they fought for the English and sometimes against.

By joining the Jacobite forces in 1688, they made a fatal mistake. Donagh MacCarthy was taken prisoner by Winston Churchill’s ancestor, the Duke of Marlborough, in the battle for Cork in 1690. Taken to the Tower of London, he escaped to France, where he was joined by other fleeing Irish landowners, known today as the Wild Geese.

The MacCarthys had left Blarney for the last time.

Blarney Castle

The home of the Blarney stone