Radnorshire Divided?

Is there any truth to the theory mentioned in a footnote to the article by A J Ellis entitled On the delimitation of the English and Welsh languages in the October 1882 issue of Y Cymmrodor? Could Radnorshire have been divided Ulster-style between the native Welsh and the descendants of a Cromwellian plantation?

Howel Lloyd, who mentions the idea (see above) was a Roman Catholic convert and a local historian with mainly Montgomeryshire interests. He was sufficiently well-regarded to make it into the pages of the Dictionary of Welsh Biography, his entry is here.

Now some of the more popular local surnames of English origin turn up in the county before the Civil War: Addis, Bufton, Harding, Mantle, Russell, Shipman, Wilcocks, Wilde. To this we have to add names that drifted into Radnorshire from the 16C plantations in Montgomeryshire (Cleaton, Hamer, Ingram, Jarman, Kinsey etc.), names that originated in the ethnic mix in and around Presteigne, and gentry names, essentially Norman, from Breconshire and Herefordshire (Baskerville, Gunter, Havard, Whitney)

This leaves us with a number of surnames which do indeed first appear in parishes in North Radnorshire during the second half of the Sixteenth Century - the Pitchfords, Bywaters, Palfreys, Wildings, Weales etc. Is there any evidence that these new families stood aloof from their Welsh neighbours? A way of spotting any such social divide would be to look at marriage records. If such a divide existed you wouldn't expect the newcomers to inter-marry in any great number with the Joneses, Davieses, Evanses and the rest. Such an aversion should be easily spotted in the lists of marriage bonds and copies of wills available on-line from the National Library of Wales.

A quick look at the marriage bonds shows that folk with English surnames were three to four times more likely to marry partners with Welsh surnames than partners with names of English origin. I suppose you'd have to do a lot more research to be certain but it doesn't look very likely that a Cromwellian plantation had any lasting identity in Radnorshire.

Lists

That great organ of Welsh identity, the Western Mail (west of where?) is indulging in a series of articles to unearth the most historically important place in Wales. A snore of academics will argue the case for various locations, here's the list:

The soccer grounds of Wales - Professor Huw Bowen
Snowdon - Professor Chris Williams
Lodge Hill, near Caerleon - Dr Ray Howell

Llyn Fawr, in the Cynon Valley, and Llyn Cerrig Bach, on Anglesey - Professor Raimund Karl
Strata Florida - Professor David Austin
Aberlleiniog Castle, Anglesey - Dr David Wyatt
Ysbyty Ifan and the tomb of Rhys ap Maredudd, Conwy - Dr Madeleine Gray
Gower churches - Dr Helen Nicholson
Llangwm Uchaf (Mon) - Dr Alun Withey
Llantrithyd House - Dr Lloyd Bowen
Middleton Hall (National Botanic Gardens) - Dr Lowri Rees
Pumlumon/The Elenydd - Dr Martin Wright
The lower Swansea Valley - Professor Huw Bowen
Merthyr - Professor Chris Evans
Washburn Cemetery, Scranton, Pennsylvania - Dr Bill Jones
Talerddig cutting, Powys - Professor Iwan Morus
Cardiff Castle - Dr Andrew Richardson
Penallta Colliery, near Ystrad Mynach - Dr Ben Curtis
The Street - Dr Paul O'Leary
Tredegar - Dr Steve Thompson
Mametz Wood - Dr Robin Barlow
Barry Island - Dr Andy Croll

No Radnorshire entries of course, unless part of the county is included within The Elenydd - THE Elenydd? Do we say The Meirionydd?

Now I realise that this exercise is not really about finding the most important historical site in Wales. Rather it's an opportunity for our current crop of historians to address their particular interests before a wider audience than the "cloister of the learned journal." If it were a serious list then surely Pilleth - where Glyndwr, with the help of the men of Maelienydd, defeated a sizable English army in the field - would be high up the table.

Any more suggestions for Radnorshire sites that might qualify in a list of sites of real importance in our nation's story?

Mugs

Not much to say about the above except for the obvious, that Radnorshire isn't in England and that the "fine old stronghold" was built just 90 years or so before the Land Army girls moved in.

On the other hand you come across comments like this from a book called Language in Geographic Context:

"the border counties of Brecon and Radnor, which have long been anglicised since Tudor times"

Now I wouldn't mind if this was penned by purveyors of crockery but it's in a tome authored by two of the leading authorities on the geographical history of the Welsh language and it's nonsense.

I could go on ........ but I've given up blogging so I won't

Forthcoming Books

I see Lolfa will be publishing a novel of Radnorshire interest this summer based on the life of Gwenllian the daughter of Owain Glyndwr. Gwenllian and her family lived at Cenarth in the parish of St Harmon.

The selling pitch on the Lolfa site mentions that the book may be of interest to those who speculate about Owain's burial site. This is usually thought to be in Herefordshire near the home of his daughter Alys Scudamore. When you think about it St Harmon would have been a better bet, especially if, as some believe, Gwenllian's husband Philip ap Rhys was such a diehard that he continued to fight on, even after the surrender of Owain's son Maredudd in 1421.

Bill Sikes the Radnorian

I've blogged about Bill Sheen before, see here.

I believe he was a model for the Dickens character Bill Sikes, although now we learn that the great novelist used the names of everyday folk from his teenage neighbourhood for some of his best-known creations. William Sykes, it seems, was a harmless tallow seller.

While not doubting that Dickens may have found the surname in that way, the character of Sikes is surely based in part on the Radnorian Sheen, once pursued from London to the Severn Arms in Penybont after slicing off the head of his jade Letitia's infant son and being subsequently found not-guilty of the murder on a legal nicety - twice!

Now Bill Sheen was not some anonymous Radnorian abroad in the smoke, he was famous, a 19C celebrity if you like. He was Sheen the infanticide, Sheen the child murderer, whose every scandalous court appearance for twenty years was reported assiduously in the public press - not least by the Thunderer itself.

Bill and his notorious mother Ann Sheen* ran brothels in Spitalfields, in particular in Wentworth Street. A street that was also home to another well known criminal, the receiver of stolen goods, Ikey Solomon - who many agree was the model for the Dickens character Fagin.

Sheen's brothels were infamous dens of child criminality where youngsters were lodged and sent out to pick pockets and plunder. Take a look at this evidence to a Select Committee of the House of Commons from 1837, just a year before the publication of Oliver Twist, evidence which was quoted verbatim in the Times.

And what of Sikes' moll, the unfortunate Nancy? Well in 1847 Bill Sheen was sentenced to two years with hard labour for violently assaulting and slashing his common law wife of eighteen years, one Mary Ann Sullivan. The Times reported that Sullivan had been "the subject of constant ill-usage" during her nearly two decades with Sheen and had frequently needed hospital attention after the brutal beatings she received. Was this violent relationship known to Dickens perhaps? He could certainly have read of the court case in 1836 where Bill had threatened to "rip up the bowels" of a lass called Mary Moore.

Radnorians may be interested in an obsequious letter Sheen wrote to the Lambeth Street magistrates from the New Prison in Clerkenwell, following the rescue of eight young mites from his clutches. Sheen boasted of "the respectability of my relations in Radnorshire." There was: a Mr___, a respectable farmer, and Mr___, shopkeeper and farmer at ___, and "aunt Sheen who lives on her own freehold estate at a place called ___, where my grandfather lived and kept his hounds for 70 years." Unfortunately the Times omits the actual names, no doubt to spare his relatives' blushes. If only the magistrates would release him, Sheen promised, he would leave London and go to Radnorshire and "never more trouble you." Thankfully for Radnorshire the magistrates ignored his plea and sent him down for 18 months.

* Like her neighbour Ikey Solomon Ann Sheen was a well-known fence - she owned a chandler's shop in Spitalfields. In 1840 at the age of 59 she was sentenced to be transported for 14 years. In the event Mrs Sheen pined away in the Millbank Penitentiary, dying in 1842. Ann left her not inconsiderable fortune in Bank Stock and properties to her favourite son, Bill.

Goodbye to all that

This blog is six years old which seems a long enough run.

When I started back in 2006 there wasn't a lot of Radnorshire history on the web and some of it was nonsense.

Now we have this and this and this. More than enough to be getting on with.

By all means check back occasionally, I'll probably post something but not on a regular basis.

Bedo Brwynllys

Note: This is an old post but since the new super improved blogger deletes posts without warning  I've had to republish. Lost six comments though. 

For me Welsh lessons in Llandrindod Grammar School lasted for the five minutes or so it took the headmaster E. V. Howells to ask the newly arrived first formers if they wanted to take French or Welsh. I chose French because that was what my pals from the National School were signing up for. My father, who like many working-class Radnorians wished he could speak the language, was disappointed and as it turned out I hated French. I would probably have hated Welsh as well, if I'd taken that. Years later when I'd picked up a bit of the lingo I translated a load of bardic poems with the help of Geiriadur Mawr. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that the three translations below probably include some howlers. Perhaps I should take another look at them with the help of the online Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru but I really can't spare the time. What can't be translated, of course, is the intricate metre and craftmanship of these poems.

They are examples of the type of poem composed by young bards advising brides not to wed and married women to take a lover. I'd guess they were just a bit of fun and performed for the amusement of the assembly in the presence of the potential or actual spouse. I'd doubt if they expressed any real romantic attachment, these bards were in the business of making a living, not parading their emotions. The first certainly sounds as if it was being declaimed to a bride and groom at a wedding feast, the second laments the cutting down of a wood by a jealous husband and the third is an example of dyfalu, the piling up of metaphor, in this case to describe an eyebrow.

The poems are by the 15C bard Bedo Brwynllys who the experts say was from Bronllys near Talgarth. Why couldn't he be from the township of Brwynllys in Llanbister parish?

Y fun ddifai, fwyn ddwyfes The blameless girl, a gentle goddess White-necked, bright as the sun on the gable, Jet brows upon two rosy cheeks, With a face like fresh snow; For beauty and grace, There’s no seabird as fair as you! God placed a roof of burnished gold Upon your hair, newly roofed gold. Is it any wonder then That love has me in its thrall, Has me languishing with sickness, Fair one, my world’s without comfort! Fair one, the girl who makes me ill, Gentle fair one, should make me well! Come fair one with your hair of gold, To the greenwood, you with the golden hair, For fear of misfortune, some sheltered bank, Fair one, your husband has an evil nature. Your kindred, fair brilliant girl, Would love to sell you, fair one: Come, to me, I’d not turn you away, Look he’s an old man! Don’t strike a bargain with an old miser And upon false promises; When he has you, the arch-miser will break his oath, You’ll never be free of him. You’ll never enjoy happiness again Not one day in ten, Only scolding each day, and anger, That will leave you pining. Graceful fair one, gossamer of light, You have a beautiful face, Love a young man who loves you, Well respected in his country, Place your faith in hands that respect you, Avoid the hands of anger; Fair one, for your life, don’t of your own free will Seek foolish servitude, not even if you’re forced. Y ddyn fwyn addwyn feinawl The slim, gentle, kindly girl, My plighted love, my rightful goddess; Such terrible work, alas for lovers, May your husband be speared, an easy task? There’s no single spot in creation Where he does not have his spies! Yet my desire is greater And he fears me, more and more. There was, for those who would make love, A pleasant grove, just ready for May; He’s killed that pretty thicket - A slaughter like that of wretched Troy! Two fellows, yesterday, with axes Came to the wood, two stupid men, And death came to the innocent crowd. It was Eiddig and his servant Who left the fair vale naked, Those enemies of the ash lined brook. This was their cruel purpose, (Let them be chased by devils! A thief whom all despise) To murder with evil hands. A bad life for such filthy wretches, Let Eiddig’s house suffer, Let a swollen rumped hangman’s horse Sit under his evil servant. He grew bitter about a fair spoken girl, He grew eager for fire, (Oh see the place where love once was whispered) The desolate grove is now a clearing Full of stumps and pathways, Where once there was wood, Tree stumps and tangled roots, Woodchips from some yokel’s axe. Little wonder that on yonder slope Eiddig is left bereft of birch trees, He keeps no wooded parkland, He tolerates no branches. This very day the man has Felled a woodland to the ground. He’d cut down the Lord’s prayer itself With his great sword in his hand! That very hand cut down the wood. A shelter for every gentle person Brought there by desire. There’s an evil about his house, A spear for his belly, the arch villain, Oh let summer give sprout to it. A disaster‘s overtaken the world, There’ll be no small saplings, Isn’t it wretched, a stockpile of logs Which will never bear their need of leaves? Where a poet was once beneath the hazels, In a shady place with a message of love, A bare expanse has now been created. Yet there’s a means, let me recite, To take revenge when summer comes: I’ll love the maid more than ever The churl will pay for burning the wood! Gwelais mewn ffair ddisgleirddyn I saw a radiant girl at a fair, She had the look of a bright mirror. I saw fine brows like a squirrel’s, How wretched there’s no better word! I saw in the wink of her eye, A sweet smile, shining and frownless. I saw again a slim-browed maid, A queen playing tricks on her lord, I responded to Olwen’s gesture, I’m mocked, caught by a fair girl. A girl’s lashes made me weep, Alas I was ever born! Not a red brow, a quiet spoken girl, Not blond nor yellow, by Mary: A slim, black brow mocked me, And left me lost for words. It’s colour was drawn with berry juice, A thin line like a rainbow; A black circle on chalk, An elegant wheel rim; Appointed, from fine velvet, To a high place, a tiny brow. Black placed in a prominent place On the sweet-wise queen, a pure black straw, A shallow boss, a compass line on chalk, The fresh hue of the blackbird, A girl’s brow (let her come to the greenwood) Of smithy soot, exceedingly thin, A handle of gleaming black marble Beneath a radiant osier chaplet. God was good, he was blameless, Placing a seal on a girl’s temple. A rod’s trace on her forehead, Part of the head’s hair, A black sign as the forehead’s seam. A fresh weld of crystal. Prettily the party placed on a maid, A pleated and divided mane; A slim guard over a blush, Gossamer on the vine’s face, And the colour, like chalk on a sheet Spattered with blackberry. A round of silk, a chosen dress, The soldered brow, a discreet mark. The tip of a wing in the snow, A barely visible string of jet beads. Slim-browed queen, a glove seam, A silk loom, fair silver brow, An untwisted thread Over the rose petals. Your brow is faultless, powder of Liere, Poppy seed blackening paper; Not a mark on a sheet, No such thing, that’s too thick. A copy of a chapel print, An exquisite stitch around a ball, An ink-crest, God’s cross, The merest wand of a round letter. I received a memorable wink, A subtle smile from a whinberry brow. My surmise on receiving the pretty nod Was that the girl would fall into my arms. She loved to play tricks on her lord, She’d not cheapen her body with a fool. Despite her winking she seeks no tryst, She’ll not come, she never said she would!

2012 - Bring it on

Radnorian wishes all readers, and especially those who take the trouble to leave comments, a happy and prosperous - ok fat chance of that - New Year.

They have a dream ......

It's December 31st 1965 and the Labour government has just received a report it commissioned on the building of a new town in Mid-Wales. The report recommends a town of some 60000 stretching 17 miles between Llani and Newtown. It looks like the dream of various businessmen, council officials and local politicians is coming to fruition. Then in March a bomb explodes at the nearby Clywedog reservoir, followed in July by Gwynfor Evans' victory at Carmarthen .... the plan to extend the West Midlands into Mid Wales is quietly dropped.

Never mind there are other cards to play and in the meantime we can all enjoy Brumbeat legends the Applejacks ... the Honeycombs might have had a girl drummer but the Solihull group had Megan Davies on bass.

Some More Radnorshire Surnames

Addis - A surname that turns up in Radnorshire as early as 1634 and which was found mainly in Bugeildy parish well into the 19C. The name is said to derive from a pet form of Adam and occurs most commonly in Herefordshire, Shropshire and Gloucestershire, see here. Ade also occurs as a Welsh patronym - the Werdutvil daughter of Ade of Bleddfa in the tax assessment of 1293 and a local princeling Meurig ab Ade, fined 100 marks for rebelling against King John in 1211, are examples. It could be that the Radnorshire families owe their origin to this forename and their name is as patronymical as their Price and Cadwallader neighbours.

Minton - The surname can be found in the 1670 Hearth Tax for Colva and was there as early as the 1650s. Researchers might miss it though since it is omitted from the index to the tax published in the 1991 Radnorshire Society Transactions. The family may have originally come from Minton in Shropshire, although by 1688 John Minton was happy enough to see his daughter christened Gwenllian in Colva parish church. There were still Mintons in Glascwm, Rhiwlen and Bryngwyn in the 19C although others had migrated to the coalfield. I'm not claiming any Radnorian connection with this "date from hell" mind.

Wozencroft - Can there be a local surname with more spelling variations: Woozencroft, Worsencroft, Wosencraft, Wostencraft, Wostencroft, Wozencraft are just some from the 1841 Census. It's a name that was found in the Radnorshire parishes of Bugeildy, Llanbister and Llanyre in the 1670 Hearth Tax, having come into the county from Montgomeryshire where it crops up in Llanidloes as early as 1578. Said to originate from the Lancashire placename Wolstencroft it no doubt entered Wales as part of the Elizabethan plantation in Western Montgomeryshire. The 19C censuses show that Wozencroft and Wozencraft are overwhelmingly names associated with Mid Wales, see here for example. Who knows, perhaps the family of the author of the book on which this cult movie is based - it's available to view on youtube - came from Radnorshire.

We will come if we are fetched......

Although Powlett Milbank, the Tory elected to serve Radnorshire in Parliament in 1895, decided not to contest the 1900 election because of ill-health, he continued as Lord Lieutenant of the county until his death in January 1918. It was in this capacity that in 1915 he expressed his keen disappointment that the men of Radnorshire were reluctant to join the army and go to war. When Sir Powlett challenged them they would respond "we will come if we are fetched."

The Military Service Act of 1916 ensured that reluctant Radnorians were indeed fetched to the colours, although in the case of the Davenport brothers, Len and Ernie, this was unnecessary, both having joined the South Wales Borderers before the start of the War. Indeed 1914 found Len in China participating in the Japanese led attack on the German controlled port of Tsintao. Later he would serve in Gallipoli before being killed in France in July 1917. His brother Ernie was gassed during the retreat from Mons and discharged as being medically unfit. Ernie died in Mardy hospital a few days before his older brother. Eighteen year old Arthur, the last surviving Davenport boy, was killed in France on 28th October 1918.

All three names are recorded on the War Memorial in Llandrindod - the loss of three brothers was not at all unusual, indeed the same memorial lists the names of three Hope brothers who also died in the First World War. The Davenport names can also be seen, although spelt incorrectly, on the memorial in St David's church Howey.

Years ago I read some letters belonging to the Davenports - a little notebook Len had used when hospitalised in England, containing snatches of conversation written down, perhaps because he was deaf. There was a bitterness about the war in various hands as well as comments that suggested that the unangelic nurse is not just a modern-day phenomenon. A fatalistic letter to his sister sent a couple of days before he was killed expressed Len's gratitude that at least his discharged brother Ernie would survive the war. As it happened Ernie had died just a few days before the letter was posted. There was a bombastic letter to his brother in France from a youthful Arthur describing a cinema newsreel he had seen and a letter to their sister Gwladys from the matron of the hospital where Ernie had been treated. "Your brother suffered a great deal before he died" it explained with a good deal more honesty than compassion.

How wise those Radnorians were who informed the bellicose Sir Powlett that they would only come if they were fetched.

D-Day Dodgers

We're the D-Day Dodgers out in Italy
Always on the vino, always on the spree

My father, with the 'tache, doing a bit of D-Day dodging out in Italy, although I suppose it might be North Africa. He would have been 100 today!

Putting on Weight

The Radnorshire Society Transactions - and many thanks to the National Library for making so much historical information available on-line - has a couple of references to a murder committed in 1554 by a William Treylo of Ackhill. William had killed one John Hebbe in Presteigne by striking him a single blow to the head with a hedge bill.

Another Treylo - a name probably derived from a local placename Maes Treylow near Discoed and responsible for modern day surnames such as Traylor, Trelloe and Trillo - who fell foul of the law was John Treylo, also of Ackhill, who was seemingly pressed to death in 1578, the punishment reserved for those who refused to plead and sometimes chosen in order to avoid a guilty verdict and the subsequent confiscation of family property by the crown. Pressing continued until 1741 while burning at the stake, a punishment by then reserved for women, wasn't abolished until 1790.

Welsh in New Radnor

How to reconcile these two quotes:

"New Radnor was planted as a Saxon colony by Harold, after his victory here over the Britons, two years before his death at Hastings. This people have never since had any sympathies with the Welsh in language, nor many in habits .." - Sir William Cockburn of Downton House, evidence to the Commission of Inquiry into the State of Education in Wales, February 1847.

"... all English here, New Radnor is not four miles from hence, where there is nothing but Welsh." - Lewis Morris in a letter written from the King's Head, Kington, February 1742.

Of course Cockburn is correct in believing that there was Saxon settlement in the area, local placenames provide abundant evidence of that, but he is certainly wrong in believing that this was a district where the Welsh language never flourished. The local gentry were patrons of the bards until the 17C and a quick glance at the Lay Subsidy of 1543 should settle the matter. Nor was there any great divide between those with English style surnames and those with patronyms. Wills from the period and names like Morgan Hoddell or Dyddgu Stones - an interesting local surname probably derived from the Four Stones at Walton - are evidence of that. And what of Anne Sasnes - Anne the Englishwoman - who witnessed a New Radnor will in 1548, a strange name in a town which had no sympathy for the Welsh language.

Perhaps Cockburn thought he was doing his neighbours a favour by disassociating them from any taint Welshness. After all this was a time when the Eton boys who were the leading Liberal political bigwigs in the area believed the Welsh to be a race of "miserable Celtic savages."

So what then of Lewis Morris? Some Welsh academics have doubted his evidence but it seems to me that it was consistent with what we know. In 1827, while describing the Welsh dialect of Llandrindod, the correspondent of the monthly magazine Y Gwyliedydd informs us that the language had retreated twenty miles in living memory - more than enough to encompass New Radnor some 80 years before. James Beaumont of the Gore, the Methodist exhorter who died in 1750, was said to be happier preaching in Welsh than in English. In 1744 a traveller to Llandrindod encountered an old man in Bleddfa who could speak no English, and between there and Llanfihangel Rhydithon heard little Engish except for an innkeeper who spoke the language "indifferent good". If the language survived in these two parishes, which from surname evidence had seen a good deal of in-migration, why not in New Radnor which had not.

Finally Sir William Cockburn might have considered the field names of Downton itself. When the railway came to New Radnor around 1860, local fields such as Pwll Mawn, Clos y Garreg, Plocau Melyn and Maes Downton were mentioned - evidence of a Welsh speaking past and a fairly recent one at that.

Musical Interlude

With a German hegemony likely in the EU will this be the future of popular music? These girls are getting bigger and blonder and those serial-killer smiles even more unsettling. I like them and at least we'd get good beer and good sausage. Of course we might get this, in which case scrub the beer and sausage.

The Stately Homes of Radnor

Did you miss this characteristically snobbish headline in the Daily Mail from a couple of weeks ago? It suggests that Downton Abbey - a popular television entertainment - is based on an "aristocratic pile" in Radnorshire. I doubt if the series would have had much success if creator Julian Fellowes, his grandmother was from Llandegley, had called the blockbuster Penybont Hall. Perhaps in coming up with the name Fellowes had in mind two other Radnorian houses - Downton House and Abbeycwmhir Hall?

Book of the Week

Real Powys, that's a good one, for a county dreamt up in the 1970s by bureaucrats with a passing but imprecise knowledge of medieval history. Anyway it's part of a series from Seren Books that includes Real Llanelli, Real Merthyr and the like, so we can excuse the faintly oxymoronic title.

The paperback consists of 39 offbeat pieces based around towns and districts in the county, some 200 pages in all. As well as the expected, Richard Booth and Adelina Patti, we also get more rootsy stuff, Harry Tuffin's, or a day at Penybont races for example. Mind you I could have done without the author's exploits with a hairy 'lumberjack' in the Abergwesyn pass.

Mistakes? Well you don't have to ford the Ithon to get from Cilmeri to Llanynys but Parker certainly knows his subject. There's an I-spy game for Gogs to while away the happy hours on the A470 - 3 points if you see a car scrape it's hubcaps on the metalled kerbing going on to Builth Bridge.

Who should read this book? Certainly the author's soap-dodging, dream-weaving, down-shifting, white-flighting, Guardian-reading, gastro-pubbing incomers. Also locals who like to read other viewpoints on the familiar, Llandrindod's fresh air for instance is "Patchouli, with faint opiate top notes." Yes we've all caught a whiff of those. At £9.99 it might also make a useful Christmas present for whichever public servant was responsible for an information board recording "the legend of Prince Llewelyn."

Verdict. It's not Paul Theroux but it'll do.

Innes Ireland - The Golden Age of Motorsport

Since the blog started I've posted a lot about Innes Ireland, the Grand Prix driver who once lived at Downton House, New Radnor, so I guess I shouldn't ignore this hour-long documentary which has just appeared on youtube.

Brycheiniog

Charitable Radnorians will be pleased that the journal Brycheiniog is now available on the Welsh Journals Online site, see here.

South will meet with North

For too long all roads led east, little wonder that Wales was an end-of-the-line country with a dead-end economy. Radnorian salutes the workers who completed this section of the north-south link ahead of time and on budget. We look forward to the by-passing of Builth and a Radnorshire in the middle of Wales rather than the middle of nowhere.

Tip: If you don't like the soundtrack mute it or better still play this.