The view from the ramparts is extensive: the valley of the Gwendraeth—the old town and its spire—the distant marshes and the sea—all blend together, and form a grand but melancholy picture, which harmonises with the feeling inspired by the aspect of the whole place and neighbourhood—
“How grand, and beautiful, and vast,
Fortress and hall of ages past!
With battlement and turret crown’d,
And iron ramparts girdled round;
Whose shadow, stretching o’er the land,
Whose bulwarks, desolately grand,
Whose chambers, voiceless and forsaken,
A tide of mingled thoughts awaken,
And dreams of fancy that restore
The Barons and the Bards of yore,
When trumpet-peal, from turret wall,
Proclaimed the knightly festival.”—MS.
The air of the place is considered salubrious and the town healthy; but the importance which it formerly derived from its situation on the banks of a fine navigable river, within half a mile of its influx into the great bay of Carmarthen, has ceased—a reverse occasioned by an accumulation of sand, which has formed a dangerous bar across the mouth of the river. Its commerce, once flourishing, has consequently declined; while the opening of collieries, and the establishment of copper-works at Llanelly—to which port that of Kidwelly is a creek—have transferred the trade to that place.
“The scale has shifted—freighted barks no more
Visit, with welcome sail, the lonely shore:
Unprofitable weeds usurp the strand—
The once wide port presents a mound of sand.
But these stout towers, defying time and tide,
Still o’er the scene in massive strength preside
Kidwelly’s walls, firm as the native rock,
Have braved, for centuries, the tempest-shock.”
Many fruitless attempts have been made to improve the navigation of the river, by removing the obstructions alluded to. In 1766, some docks and a short canal were constructed here. The navigation was afterwards transferred to the “Kidwelly Canal Company,” by whom it was extended about two miles up the valley of the Gwendraeth; and a branch, three miles and a half in length, was constructed to communicate with Pembrey harbour. Here were formerly both iron and tin works, the former of which have been entirely abandoned, and the latter are continued only in a diminished scale.
Kidwelly received its first charter of incorporation from King Henry VI. James II., in the sixteenth year of his reign, granted to its inhabitants their present charter, by which the government is vested in a mayor, a recorder, two bailiffs, and a common council of twelve aldermen, and twelve principal burgesses, assisted by a town-clerk, chamberlain, two sergeants-at-mace, and other officers.
Ancient dwellings near Manorbeer Castle.—See Note, p. 327.