Chester Castle.
A watercolour of Chester Castle, included in A Tour in Wales by artist Thomas Pennant (1726-1798), chronicling three journeys he made through Wales between 1773 and 1776. Chester was the base chosen for Henry II’s operation in North Wales in 1157: it gave him the opportunity to attack by land and also by sea, thanks to the River Dee. In 1283, Henry’s great-grandson Edward I subdued the Welsh princes at last, annexed the Kingdom of Gwynedd, and gave the title of Prince of Wales to his son, the future Edward II. Ever since the days of Edward III (r. 1327-1377) the title has been conferred on the heir to the English crown.
Part 1 of 2
THE invasion of Wales was both by land and sea. The English forces assembled near Chester, on Saltney Marsh, and were joined by Madoc Ap Meredith,* prince of Powys, while the Welsh forces under [Owen] Gwyneth* with his three sons were entrenched at Basingwerk.*
The King, with his youthful daring,* set off at once by way of the sea coast, hoping to surprise the Welsh. But Owen’s sons were on the watch and suddenly attacked the foe in the narrow passage of Coleshille,* where they had secretly hidden a powerful ambuscade. The English, entangled in the woody, marshy ground, were easily routed by the nimble light-armed Welsh. Suddenly a cry was heard “The King is slain,” as a result of which Henry of Essex, the hereditary Standard-bearer of England, dropped the Royal Standard and fled in terror.* King Henry, however, soon showed himself alive, rallied his troops and cut his way through the ambush with such vigour that Owen judged it prudent to withdraw from Basingwerk, and seek a safer retreat amongst the hills round Snowdon.
* Madog ap Maredudd, Prince of Powys from 1132 to his death in 1160.
* Owain of Gwynedd (?-1170), Prince of Gwynedd from 1137, succeeding his father Gruffudd [Griffith] ap Cynan. His brother was Cadwaladr ap Gruffydd (?1100-1172).
* Henry turned twenty-four on March 5th, 1157.
* Basingwerk Abbey near Holywell in Flintshire, consecrated in 1132.
* Coleshille or Coleshill in Flintshire, Wales, some seven miles west of Chester near the mouth of the River Dee. The battle is sometimes called the Battle of Ewloe. Ewloe Castle was raised nearby as a hunting lodge by Llewelyn ap Gruffudd, Prince of Wales (r. 1255-1282); it still stands, though abandoned in 1277 and now ruined.
* See also The Battle of Assandun in 1016, where King Edmund Ironside was almost undone by a similar ruse.
Précis
Seizing an opening afforded by Welsh infighting, Henry II made a bid to annex the region in 1157. His land army was ambushed at Colehill, and fared so badly that word spread of the king’s death in battle, and even his standard-bearer fled; but Henry fought back so vigorously that his enemy, Owain of Gwynedd, withdrew to the mountains. (58 / 60 words)
Part Two
Tomb of Owain Gwynedd, Bangor Cathedral.
This nook in Bangor Cathedral is traditionally held to hold the remains of Owain of Gwynedd, who offered such stout resistance to Henry II in the later twelfth century (the tomb itself is of a later date). Wales has remained an English possession since 1283, but limited devolution was achieved following a referendum in 1997, and today Wales has its own Parliament. The Welsh language, banned in courts and other government contexts by Henry VIII in 1536 but kept alive by ordinary people, was officially restored in 1993. See also The Wise Man of Pencader.
Henry pushed on to Rhuddlan,* and there fortified the castle. Meanwhile a great fleet under the command of [his ally] Madoc Ap Meredith had sailed for Anglesey,* where a few troops were landed, who ravaged the country and even plundered the churches. Indeed so outrageous was their conduct that the incensed islanders combined to attack the invaders as they were returning to their ships overloaded with spoils, and cut them to pieces.
The troops that had remained on board were so terrified at the fate of their comrades that they forthwith sailed back to Chester,* only to hear on their arrival that the war was over. Owen, afraid of being hemmed in between the English army and the fleet, had sued for peace, reinstated his banished brother, done homage to King Henry, and given hostages for his future loyalty. As the South Wales princes were all vassals of North Wales, Owen’s submission was equivalent to a formal acknowledgment of Henry’s rights as lord paramount over the whole country, and the King was technically justified in boasting that he had brought the whole of Wales under his jurisdiction.*
* A town near Rhyl, a little further west around the coast of North Wales. Rhuddlan is pronounced rith-lan, where rith rhymes with with.
* A large island off the north west coast of Wales, across the Menai Strait from Bangor.
* By sailing back east along the north coast of Wales, and then up the River Dee.
* Owain’s setback here in 1157 and another in 1163 proved only temporary; in 1165 he broke free from Henry and England, and though it was often imperilled by dynastic squabbles Gwynedd remained independent of the English crown. Indeed Gwynedd grew under Llywelyn ap Iorwerth (r. 1201-1240) and his grandson Llewelyn ap Gruffudd (r. 1255-1282), the first and last independent ruler of Wales to be recognised as Prince of Wales by the English. But in December 1282, Llewelyn ap Gruffudd fell in battle against Edward I, who formally annexed Wales to the English crown the following year. Edward created his son and heir, the future Edward II, Prince of Wales in 1301.
Précis
The heroism of Henry’s land forces was not shared by his fleet. The sailors’ indiscipline so enraged the Welsh in Anglesey that they were driven back in shame to Chester. Fortunately for Henry, in the meantime Owain had surrendered, allowing the English king to believe that his campaign for the subjection of Wales had been a success. (57 / 60 words)
