The Welsh Marches: history, castles and CAKE

   The term Welsh Marches (French "marche = border - in Welsh "Y Mers") was first recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 and denotes an imprecisely defined area along and around the border between England and Wales. This region, "Marchia Walliae", formed a porous barrier between England and "Pura Wallia" (true Wales), and was a frontier society created by William I when he established 3 Marcher Lordships to subdue and govern the unruly Welsh. Castles sprang up immediately and were symbols of power as well as practical means of defence and attack. These were mostly wooden motte-and-bailey structures but later were enlarged and fortified in stone: the Marches still have the highest concentration of such castles in Gt. Britain - and possibly the best CAKE.

The Marcher Lords

Chepstow and Usk castles

  William I honoured 3 of his most loyal supporters as earls with portions of this area: Hugh d'Avranches in Chester; Roger de Montgomerie in Shrewsbury and William fitzOsbern in Hereford. Each lordship was distinct, independent and different from the rest. Yet all the Marcher Lords had powers unlike those of comparable magnates in England. Their remit if keeping the region in order at all costs without interference allowed them particular rights: to make war on their neighbours for personal gain; to own lands exempt from taxation; to be able to create forests (uninhabited spaces for hunting), markets and boroughs.  They could keep any territory they conquered but the area was never completely subjugated.
   After the pattern of the Welsh princes, they owed allegiance to the crown in times of war but otherwise had a remarkable degree of autonomy and could construct castles free from the restrictions imposed in England. Wherever castles were built, small town tended to grow up around them; examples are Monmouth, Chepstow and Ludlow. At first these towns were little more than groups of merchants living under the protection of the seignorial castle but, in the second half of the 13th century, they acquired corporate existence, Monmouth being one of the first.
   The lordships were geographically discrete, separate from England and ruled by their own laws "sicut regale" - "like unto a king" as Gilbert de Clare stated. The Welsh provided wartime man power for English kings throughout this period (their bowmen were highly skilled) and smaller lordships proliferated as the Normans encourage immigration from Norman and Angevin regions. The king's writ never ran during this period in the whole area.
 

Organisation

Ludlow Castle

   The area tended to become divided into the Englishry and the Welshry: the incomers took possession of the lower, fertile parts for rural settlement and arable farming, using the meadows and riverside regions for feeding livesstock. Sometimes manors were established. The Welsh were not usually displaced but, by and large, were left with the uplands and other less profitable land for sheep and cattle with winter quarters ("hendre") and summer pastures ("hafod"). It is notable that "da" meant "cattle" or "wealth/goods" and taxes could be paid by "cymorth", the rendering of a valuable beast to the lord. Other income came from the sale of demesne crops, tenant rents, court fines and resources such as mills and fisheries. 

   The unit of governance was not called the hundred as in England but the "commote" and the Domesday Book has entries for those which were under Norman control but still subject to Welsh law and custom. They were assessed for military purposes and taxation and Welsh law was administered in Welsh courts by Welsh officials although English officials might deal with English tenants - disputes arose over this jurisdiction (similar to those caused by the choice of a rugby referee of an England/Wales match but less bloody.)

   Ludlow Castle later became the organising centre of the Council of Wales (and the Marches) until its abolition in 1536 by Henry VIII. Between the high point in the Middle Ages and that demise, there was a gradual decline in powers after Edward I, on conquering the area, established shire counties on the English model instead. Yet the notion remained until the Industrial Revolution.

  The Welsh Marches retain a distinctive flavour and offer the visitor fascinating historical sites to savour with rewards of excellent CAKE after an educational and enjoyable trip or microadventure. Here is the River Wye near Symonds Yat on a lovely winter walk. Buses roam all over, from Chepstow Castle onwards to Usk Castle as well as the later Raglan Castle. A little further away is Ludlow Castle, intriguing with its round chapel - and magnificent Goodrich Castle still houses Roaring Meg, the formidable mortar.  Further information about William fitzOsbern, one of the powers behind the original invasion can be found in my post about him. For an account of trade and markets in the area click here.

Six weapons of war in castles in the Welsh Marches

At Caerphilly Castle
   As far as I know Caerphilly wins the body count with 4 Medieval siege machines in its grounds (to the left as you enter.)
  The trebuchet is probably the best known and many parents will have helped their child construct one out of the inside of loo rolls as a school project. Although the machine started off as a traction engine with men pulling at it (15 to 45 were needed), it later became what is known as a counterweight or counterpoise trebuchet, capable of flinging projectiles of up to 90kg or even more about 300 metres and its use continued well after the introduction of gunpowder.
   This later version has a gravity-powered lever using potential energy so that when the weight box falls, the throwing arm (4 to 6 times the length of the counterweight portion) hurls the object contained in the sling over the castle walls. It could fire a stone every 15 seconds but sometimes plague-ridden corpses were thrown - an early act of biological warfare. Even after it fell into general disuse, it was employed when cannon had too short a range and, I am delighted to relate, there are pumpkin chunking [sic] competitions in the USA which keep it going.
   The mangonel was a type of catapult with poorer accuracy than the later trebuchet and with a lower trajectory and higher velocity. It was used to destroy the walls of a castle rather than hurl objects over them and the items used might be rocks or firepots (vessels filled with burning material to create a fireball) but, when they were employed to send something over, that could be a human or animal carcass or head, probably diseased. This was very effective as conditions inside were cramped, with poor hygiene, shortage of food and crawling with vermin, ideal for the spreading of epidemics. It needed about 20 men pulling on ropes attached to the counterweight and its effectiveness depended largely on those troops being well-trained. No-one wants a bovine head ricocheting!
   The ballista was a highly accurate missile weapon, mentioned in the Bible circa 783-742 BC. It shot darts or spherical stones and assisted the Greeks in warfare and later the Romans in their conquest of Europe. After the time of Julius Caesar, the ballista became a permanent feature of the Roman army, being constantly modified to improve performance usually as an anti-personnel weapon.The largest in the 4th century could fire a dart more than 1200 yards (1,100 metres). It gave way to the trebuchet and mangonel in the Middle Ages and to the cross-bow as a sniper weapon: armies needed machines which were simple and cheap to make and easy to maintain - the ballista needed anointing.
   The perrier (sometimes called a traction trebuchet) had its origins in Ancient China where it needed 6 men in the crew and had a range of 110 metres, a projectile weight of 5 kilos and did damage to walls or attackers. The one in Caerphilly Castle was fired for a TV programme by Dan Snow when it was - as we can see on YouTube - innocuous. It was a counterpoise machine which propelled objects from a sling as did the trebuchet but the perrier was lighter and more transportable than other throwing engines and its use spread to the west during the Crusader wars of the 12th century.

Goodrich Castle - Roaring Meg
   This nifty but powerful little number was built especially for the siege of Goodrich Castle during the Civil War. Colonel Birch ordered the mortar to be made, probably by a local manufacturer near Lydbrook, Howbrook furnace. in 1646. The owner, John Browne supplied the Parliamentarians with arms.
   It has a 15.5 inch barrel diameter, could fire a 2cwt hollow ball filled with gunpowder and was instrumental in the capture of Goodrich Castle by Sir Thomas Fairfax. It is reported that Colonel Birch was so over-excited by this new implement that he insisted on firing the last 19 balls himself. (You can see a pile of cannon balls nearby.) The gun was then taken to Raglan Castle where it was effective in bringing about a bloodless truce.
   In modern times the gun has received homage in Monty Python in a scurrilous joke which I blush to repeat and will hide further down below the links so that the onus is on you not to look!

Caldicot Castle: Nelson's gun

   Just as you go into Caldicot Castle, you pass a gun from Nelson's flagship, HMS Foudroyant, which my schoolgirl French tells me means "blaster" or "thunderer". Designed by Sir John Henslow and constructed in Plymouth, she was launched on 31st March 1798, one of only 2 British-built 80-gun ships of the period, (the other being HMS Caesar). She was Nelson's flagship from 6 June 1799 to the end of June 1801 but it cannot be boasted that she took part in any major fleet action. After serving 17 useful years she became a boys' training vessel.
   Under Nelson, in 1799,  she was involved in attempts to return the Neapolitan royal family to Naples and it was there that Nelson began his affair with Emma, Lady Hamilton. The Neapolitan king and queen later boarded her as well as the Hamiltons. There was some involvement against 2 French ships during the Napoleonic Wars.
   After her period as a gunnery training vessel from 1862-1884, she was placed on the Sales List in 1891 and went for £2,350 to J. Read of Portsmouth who resold her to German shipbreakers. This caused public protest and Wheatley Cobb bought her as a training vessel for boys. The restoration cost £20,000 and the money had to be found somehow.
   HMS Foudroyant was therefore taken on tour to be exhibited at British seaside resorts and was being towed to Blackpool in June 1897 when a huge storm blew her ashore, damaging the North Pier and needing the lifeboat to rescue all 27 men aboard. It was impossible to refloat her and so the guns were removed and the wreck sold for £200. December gales caused further final damage and local craftsmen used the flotsam to make furniture and wood panelling: the bell is in Blackpool Town Hall and a gun here in Caldicot.

You can see all these machines by visiting the castles by bus but, unfortunately, they will not let you fire them for fun unless you happen to be Dan Snow. Details of transport are given on the blog articles for each castle: Caerphilly Castle, Goodrich Castle and Caldicot Castle. Raglan Castle is also worth a detour.

Monty Python joke: "The whole garrison banged roaring Meg and shot their balls into the French." I did warn you - and now that you have taken a naughty peek you do not deserve any CAKE.

Raglan Castle

A Toff's Castle
   Raglan Castle is stunningly imposing but less as a belligerent military fortress than as a nobleman's vast home.  It is a fortified palace in the French style with its hexagonal towers. Built by a father-and-son team, it showed off their wealth and position and saw less warfare than a smaller one such as that in Usk. Because of the relatively late dates of construction, the period was comparatively peaceful. Henry Tudor, future King Henry VII, spent some of his childhood here.

Construction - military
   Building was begun in the 15th century by Sir William ap Thomas (knighted by Henry VI) and the castle marks a transitional stage between a military fortification and a palatial residence in keeping with the growing riches and power of the family. There was the 6-sided, 5-storey Twr Melyn Gwent (yellow tower of Gwent, probably so called because of the yellow lichen growing on it) with 10 foot thick walls and surrounded by a deep water-filled moat, which could be held if the rest of the site were taken in battle. The high quality carved masonry spoke of the family's affluence. There were circular gun loops in the Kitchen Tower; the battlements and Closet Tower have machicolations from which from which the enemy could be attacked from above.

Construction - domestic and other additions
  Sir William's son, William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, built the superb gatehouse block and added the residential apartments of the Fountain Court.
   William Somerset contrived the showy second-floor long gallery which would have been heated and hung with panelling, portraits and tapestries and was ideal for the sumptuous social activities of the upper classes. The Fountain Court, which once had a fountain at the centre, the base of which can still be seen, contained a range of pleasing apartments, probably for visitors. These had fireplaces and handsome windows as glass was becoming cheaper and larger sheets were available in the 16th century, a fact that William Somerset welcomed to let in light to his probably gloomy home. The family had private accommodation, the high status of which was indicated by superbly carved masonry including heraldic badges round the windows.
   Later a moat walk was created with busts of Roman Emperors in niches decorated with shells, as was the fashion of the period, and elaborate gardens were laid out with ponds, orchards and deer. The bowling green is still there to be appreciated.

  

The Civil War

   Although the Wars of the Roses had been rumbling on, the main threat to Raglan Castle came with the Civil War. The Marquis of Worcester, Henry Somerset, (grandson of William Somerset), a Catholic aristocrat, with an income then of over £24,000 p.a., was one of the richest men in the kingdom and had a household of 500. He had poured nearly a million pounds into the coffers of King Charles' war effort and now bailed him out yet again and allowed him to stay there for 3 weeks. He was therefore a prime target and made preparations for defence: the Roundheads pounded the castle relentlessly under the charge of Colonel Thomas Morgan with 1500 troops. The Marquis was hit at dinner by a musket ball but passed the incident off with a quip about his head-piece although some of the women fainted. 

   Sir Thomas Fairfax, arriving on 7th August 1646 to lead the assault, brought up Roaring Meg, a kind of super-cannon intended to lob missiles over the walls, along with others, but they were never used. Finally, letters were exchanged and a bloodless outcome reached by its surrender on 19th August 1646, after - in total - a 10 week seige, the Marquis pleading for the safety of 2 young pigeons as he left. 

   Instructions were given for the castle to be completely destroyed but this did not happen. Men with pickaxes removed the top storey of the 5 of the Great Tower. Later it was decided to "slight" the castle, render it incapable of military use: this was done to parts by undermining (inserting wood and then firing it). All traces of aristocratic life were systematically smashed or ripped out. Even the fine books in the library were wrecked and the fish killed by breaking the walls of their enclosures.

Your visit

   I have skated the surface of this castle's fascinating history and shall return to its various aspects later, in particular to the character of the Marquis of Worcester who glows from the past in rich colour. You can spend hours here lolling on the grass enjoying the superb views as well as looking for traces of the past on the walls of the courtyards such as heraldic shields, intricate stonework edging and gargoyles. There were stonemasons' marks indicating how much work each man had done. There is a small but well-stocked shop with upmarket wall hangings (and toilets - you are a little way from the village.)

Chimneypiece in long gallery, late 16th century

   The walk from the bus stop in Raglan village takes about 15 minutes heading off behind the Beaufort and is quite pleasant apart from crossing the busy dual carriageway of the A449. Raglan is served by 2 buses, the 60 which can take you to Monmouth with its connections to Henry V since it was in the castle there that he was born. and the 83 from Monmouth to Abergavenny where a brutal massacre took place one Christmas in its castle.
 
   Or you could go in the other direction on the number 60 to Usk with its castle and the nearby battle of Pwll Melyn against Owain Glyndwr's forces or further onwards to Caerleon with its Roman remains.
 
  Opening times for Raglan Castle
 
  On the bus, on your way home, you will find your mind reliving all these images.