Crutherland Cave Calderglen

Slightly outside the confines of Calderglen Country Park, in East Kilbride, South Lanarkshire is an area in Glassford Parish known as the Crutherland Estate. The main residence of the estate was Crutherland House which is now known as the Crutherland Hotel. Within the polices of the former Crutherland Estate and slightly south of where the Rotten Burn meets the Calder Water is a cave nestled in the rockface. The shady den sits at the top of a romantically, rugged crag and is of snug dimensions; fitting about 8-10 people crammed in. Many inscriptions of people's initials and so on mark the feature inside and out, including a date of the late 1700s. There is also a possible ancient Viking inscription on the northern wall of the cave, but this has not been confirmed. How the feature was formed is uncertain, but it does not appear to be manmade. Such a cave may have been used by the ancient pagan tribes who used to inhabit this area in the 1st-6th centuries. The cave may have even served as a hiding place for the local lairds in times of danger, such as when the English army burned down the nearby Torrance House, due to the local lairds being sympathetic to the Hamiltons. In the riverbed of the Calder Water nearby can be seen preserved ancient footprints of various species including birds. Slightly to the south of this feature at the base of the rock face an entire slice of rock has been excavated deep into the rock face. This is without doubt an ironstone mine which dates from the late 1700s/mid 1800s. These features are generally very unknown, however, the local fishermen who fish the Calder seem to know about the two caves.