Scenes in North Wales / With Historical Illustrations, Legends, and Biographical Notices

by G. N. Wright

FLINT CASTLE.

Flint, an ancient borough town and the capital of the shire, is situated upon the banks of the navigable estuary of the river Dee, and was anciently an important military position and valuable maritime situation. It was probably a Roman citadel or encampment, afterwards adopted by the ancient British as being happily circumstanced both for commerce and secure habitation; and, lastly, selected by the conqueror of Wales, Edward the First, as an appropriate site for the erection and establishment of a vast military depôt. The borough was erected in the year 1283, and is contributory with Holywell, Rhuddlan, Caerwys, Caergwrle, and St. Asaph in returning one member to parliament. The decay of trade here, and the vast increase of commercial prosperity in the vicinity of Mold, in addition to its more central position, have occasioned the transfer of the great sessions from Flint to that town. Here, however, all prisoners are confined, and the county jail, an admired and clever design by Turner, stands in a healthy elevated position within the courtyard, of the ancient castle. Provision has been made in the interior for the infliction of that most cruel of all species of earthly punishments, solitary confinement; but the habitual morality of the Cambrians has superseded the necessity of its operation, and the constitution of Britain, which disclaims all species of torture, must assuredly shrink from this, the most merciless of all. The following inscription, which is engraven on a tablet above the principal gate, was written by the learned and accomplished Mr. Pennant:—

“In the twenty-fifth year of his Majesty, George the Third, in the Sheriffalty of Thomas Hanmer, Bart. this prison was erected, instead of the ancient loathsome place of confinement, in pity to the misery of even the most guilty, to alleviate the sufferings of lesser offenders, or of the innocent themselves, whom the chances of human life may bring within these walls. Done at the expense of the country: aided by the subscriptions of several of the gentry, who, in the midst of most distressful days, voluntarily took upon themselves part of the burden, in compassion to such of their countrymen on whom fortune had been less bounteous of her favours.”

The castle, build by Edward the First, and the outer walls of which are still entire, is placed upon a freestone rock jutting into the river Dee, in a north-east direction from the town, with which it was originally connected by a drawbridge falling against the barbacan, a fine remain of the Norman style, but now nearly demolished. The first design consisted of a square building, flanked at three corners by massive towers, with a keep or citadel, called the double tower, removed a little distance from the remaining angle of the square. This must have been an inaccessible prison before the invention of gunpowder; it was approached from the castle court by a drawbridge, and was formed by concentric walls six feet in thickness, the intermural gallery being eight feet wide, and encircling a central apartment of about twenty feet in diameter.

The foundation of Flint Castle is attributed by all chroniclers to Edward the First, and dated in 1275. About six years after its completion it was surprised, and nearly wrested from Edward, in a sudden insurrection of the Welsh, and was only relieved by the greatest activity and courage on the part of the English king. The reception of Piers Gaveston, in the year 1302, was the next historic event of consequence that occurred here, this was followed by the appointment of the Black Prince as governor, A.D. 1335. In the year 1385 Flint Castle, with some lands of the Lord Audley, were granted, by Richard the Second, to De Vere, Earl of Oxford, whom he farther honoured by creating Earl of Dublin and Lord Chief Justice of Chester. On the attainder of De Vere, Percy, Earl of Northumberland, extorted a grant of this castle from his unsuspecting monarch, where he afterwards basely betrayed him into the hands of his rival Bolingbroke.

Richard was in Ireland when he received an invitation from the treacherous Percy to meet his rival, who professed his only objects to be the restoration of his property, inquiry into the death of his uncle, and that the kingdom should be allowed a parliament. To all which reasonable requests the king consented; and passing over to Conway, and thence, at the pressing solicitation of the false Northumberland who accompanied him, advancing towards Flint, he met, in the recesses of the hills at Penmaen Rhôs, a party of soldiers assembled. At length, perceiving that treachery was meant, he attempted to turn his horse round, but Percy springing forward, grasped the bridle, and in this forcible manner conducted him to Rhuddlan Castle, where they dined, and thence to Flint. Stowe details the interview at Flint between Richard and Lancaster in the following circumstantial manner: “The Duke of Lancaster entered the castle all armed, his helmet excepted; King Richard came down to meet him, and the Duke, as soon as he saw the king, fell on his knees, and coming nearer unto him, he kneeled a second time, with his hat in his hand; and the king then put off his hoode, and spoke first. ‘Fair cousin of Lancaster, you are right wellcome.’ The duke, bowing low to the ground, answered, ‘My lord, I am come before you sent for me, the reason why I will shewe you. The common fame among your people is such, that ye have for the space of twenty, or two and twenty, years ruled them very rigorously: but, if it please our lord, I will helpe you to govern better.’ The king answered, ‘Fair cousin of Lancaster, sith it pleaseth you, it pleaseth me well!’ The duke then, with a high sharp voyce, bad bring forth the king’s horses, and two little naggs, not worth fourtie franks, were brought forthe; the king was set on the one, and the Earl of Salisbury on the other; and thus the duke brought them from Flint to Chester; from whence, after one night’s rest, they were conveyed to London.”

In the civil wars of Charles the First’s reign this fortress was garrisoned for the king, having been repaired at the expense of Sir Roger Mostyn, the governor. It was closely invested in 1643, by Colonel Brereton and Sir Thomas Myddleton, and held out until compelled to surrender from want of food and ammunition, having obtained from the enemy the most honourable conditions. The royalists a second time crept into possession, and defended themselves for a while, but yielded at last to the disciplined forces of General Mytton. In the month of December, 1646, the castles of Flint, Hawarden, and several others in the principality, were dismantled by the orders of parliament.

RHUDDLAN CASTLE.

The time-decayed honours of Rhuddlan frown over the fragments of monastic greatness, and throw the little dwellings of the village into an insignificant obscurity by the effect of contrast. The lofty and substantial towers of this military relic are rendered more conspicuous by the remarkable flatness of the circumjacent district, and as its accompaniments are devoid of any picturesque attractions, it relies wholly on historic and classic recollections for the interest it uniformly excites. The little place itself, though an ancient contributary borough, retains nothing of wealth or comfort in its exterior. It boasts but one tolerable street, a range of warehouses for the storage of goods landed at the quays, and a handsome bridge of one large arch, and one auxiliary, erected in 1598. The Clwyd, which flows below the castle walls, and passes by the town, is navigable by vessels of small burden up to the wharfs of Rhuddlan, to which fortunate circumstance the continuance of a modern settlement here is probably to be attributed.

Near the centre of the town, and on the north side of the high street, are situated the scanty remains of the hall in which King Edward once convoked a parliament. They are now incorporated with the gabel of a cottage; one small doorway and the architrave of a pointed window forming all the witnesses that can be produced to identify the court in which the never to be forgotten statute of Rhuddlan was enacted. The late Dean of St. Asaph caused a tablet to be inserted in the only remaining wall of the Rhuddlan Council Hall bearing this inscription: “This fragment is the remains of the building where King Edward the First held his parliament, in 1283, [101] in which was passed the statute of Rhuddlan, securing to the principality of Wales its judicial rights and independence.”