Exploring the 'Old' Road from Swanzey Town to Oystermouth by Carol Powell

Exploring the 'Old' Road from

Swanzey Town to Oystermouth Castle

by Carol Powell MA

 

Until 1826, when the Swansea to Oystermouth Turnpike Road opened, there had been no coastal road around Swansea Bay from Swansea Town  to Mumbles, as the ground along the shore between Norton and Swansea consisted of sand burrows, marshy land and forest. Many people wishing to walk or ride along the shortest route to and from Swansea,  crossed a somewhat firmer but, still dangerous track of sand on Swansea Bay, one incident reporting in the Cambrian on 18 February 1804 describing when 'a man travelling between Mumbles and Swansea on horseback, fell into a mud hole'.

Medieval Swanzey

However, there had been a far older road dating back many centuries, connecting the town with Oystermouth, but situated away from the shore. This article will  take a journey through time  along this 'old' road, to view some of the places and   'meet' a few of the people of  yesteryear, along the way.

Medieval Swanzey

From: The History of Swansea  by W. S. K. Thomas , 1990

Swanzey had been founded within fifty years of the Norman Invasion and over time evolved into a walled town with a castle within, built around 1099-1101,  by Henry de Newburgh. A map of the medieval town  circa 1400, shown above, shows a street plan very much like today's centre, with Wynd [sic] Street, Castle Bailey Street and High Street, as well as Fischer and Frog Streets already in place, as was St. Mary's Church and Goat Street. The Tithe Barn, Plas House and the Town Hall have all now disappeared and the castle remains that we see today are those of a more recent building with a motte and bailey.  The town walls ran approximately from the later Rutland Street area, along Whitewalls and Orchard Street, down King's Lane, along the Strand and back to Rutland Street. There were several gates in the wall – Donton (down town) at the south end, near the bottom of today's Wind Street, Bove-ton (above town) at the north end, near King's lane, where the road still narrows today, Wassail Gate at the south-west and the West Gate.

Gorge Yates's Map of Glamorgan, 1799
Published by J. Cary, 21 May 1799
(West Glamorgan Archive WGAS D/D Z  134/3)

The road to Oystermouth exited  the town at the West Gate on West Strete [sic], which was approximately co-terminus with today's College Street,  progressing through countryside along Gower Street, past  St Helen's Convent, passing the fields known as 'White Stiles' or Whitt Stills', then up the hill near what became Bryn-y-mor Road, through what we know as Uplands and on towards the top of Brynmill Lane, Sketty Green and the Bryn, crossing the wide open countryside to the bridge crossing  at Blackpill. 

         What appears to be the same 'old' road, was recorded in a document dated 9 July 1400, when Plantagenet King Henry IV assigned to Elizabeth, the widow of  the disgraced Thomas de Mowbray, Earl of Nottingham and Marshal of England, 'a third part of Gower, which included the area, bounded partly by 'the whole way which leads from Weststrete of the town towards Sketti and thence towards the Blakepulle on the north side. . .'

Down Brynmill Lane, there were grist and fulling mills, built back in 1427 and 1449, 'adjoineing to the town of Swanzey called Brynmylles, situated within the franchise of Swansea on the banks of Pistyll Gwyn, which formed the border of the town.'  In 1478, John Craddock, the Port Reeve that year,  described ' . . . the farm of three water and corn mills . . . leased for sixteen years to Gro ap Ievan  and William ap Henry.

          In 1650, Cromwell's survey noted that the profitable mills were worth £60 per annum, and were probably the town's main source of flour. By 1760, Simon Llewelyn and his wife had inherited the mills and by 1786, Ben Rose owned them, receiving a new sixty-year  lease in 1796 for the holding, which comprised the mills, fourteen acres and four ponds. By 1803, the miller was David Harry, but they were advertised to be let in 1816, were auctioned in 1818, by which time they were 'out of repair.' Later, they became part of John H. Vivian's estate. 

 

         Several Charters were granted to the town, the first in 1153-4, but one  in 1165, created Burgesses, who were each to be granted a plot of land called a burgage within the walls and an area of pasture outside the town, but within the boundary marked by the Pistyll Gwyn (the stream at Brynmill). By 1400, West Strete [sic] was fringed by Burgages leased  by  the town's Burgesses from the King, as were Seintmarie, Fischeristrete and High Streets, each comprising a house and outbuildings on long plots of land with  narrow street frontages.   Each Burgess would have rights to common land, hunting, fishing and a share in any wreckage washed up along the shore. For these privileges, The Earl of Worcester received 'burgage rents of one shilling per annum.' That year, when the population was still only around 1,000, due to the Black Death back in 1348, which had killed half the people, Burgess and Port Reeve, Master John Fairwode was leasing two and a half burgages  on West Strete and one on Fischeristrete [sic]. He was an  important man, as the town was 'run' by the Port Reeve with the assistance of twelve Aldermen. Later, as the population grew, the plots could be split into smaller additional units.

Swansea held twice weekly markets at the upper end of Castle  Square and annual fairs trading  in leather, hides, wool, which was woven and 'fulled,' as well as butter, cheese and grain, so a road was essential for the passage of people, goods and animals. The town became a focus for important markets and fairs, as noted by John Leland, King Henry VIII's Antiquary, who said in the sixteenth century that  'Swansea is the market town and chief place of Gower.' 

Swansea Market, 1799

 In 1650, Oliver Cromwell  gave another charter to the town, which he considered 'an ancient port town and populous (1,887 in 1639) situate on the sea-coasts towards France, convenient for shipping and resisting foreign invasions.' Some two hundred-and-fifty years later, The Cambrian dated  1 June 1816, advertised a new fair to be held on the burrows near the Red Lion Public House at Blackpill at the request of graziers and butchers for cattle sheep, pigs and horses. The paper commented that  'As other merchandies will be brought for sale, it is presumed that this fair will combine business with amusement.' It was also in the stream near the Roman Bridge and the Mill that the first baptismal service was held by the growing band of local baptists in June 1847.

 

As the population grew, Swansea and the nearby valley became an industrial and air-polluting centre, with a copper works opening in 1716, lead works in 1755, manufactories.' pottery in 1764 and Zinc in 1777, plus many more as time went by. The Rev. J. Evans in his 'Letters written during a tour through South Wales in 1803', wrote 'if not unwholesome, a very disagreeable place of residence . . . volumes of smoke from the different manufactories.' 

          The town expanded to the north, as people poured into the area  to work and live among the industries, whereas some of the wealthier residents, among them those who owned the works, chose to build grand houses to the west of the town away from the pollution, several of their parklands, bordering  'our' road.

  Some of these include:-

In 1847, Calvert Jones inherited the Heathfield Estate, which he developed naming mansel Street after his brother.

John Crow Richardson, the eldest son of John Richardson and Elizabeth nee Clarke,  of the Copper ore family, moved to Pantygwydr House in the early 1850s, married first to Elizabeth Walters and then to Elizabeth Ross, He was a Colonel of the 3rd Glamorgan Corps of Militia, a Trustee of the Swansea Harbour Trust and a co-founder of the Sailors' Home. He was Mayor of Swansea in 1860-1 and became High Sheriff of Glamorgan in 1881. 

Saint Helens House

National Library of Wales

In 1794, Swansea-born John Jones, following a distinguished career with the East India Company and the Royal Navy, purchased St Helen's House and its lands from the Herbert family, but which had originally been built as a convent by Augustinian Nuns back in medieval times. He had it rebuilt as a neo-classical villa designed by William Jernigan and horses, cattle and sheep grazed the estate. He became an Alderman in 1819 and Port Reeve in 1820. He and his wife, Ann lived there until his death in a carriage accident in 1828 and the house, furniture and plate was bequeathed after her death to his nephews. The house was demolished  around 1900. 


The Rhyddings, 'a very desirable family residence' {Cambrian 6 december 1850}  was built around 1715 and its occupants included Henry de la Beche, geologist, who moved there in 1839 and Thomas Bowdler from 1775 until his death in 1825. Parc Wern, the home of Capt. F Hickey, RN was built near 'our' road in the eighteenth century. William Henry Smith known as 'Waterworks Bill' lived there in 1842, before it was altered and enlarged in the 1850s by its next owner, Henry Hussey Vivian. A short distance from the road at the top end of the Singleton estate, was 'Verandah' a cottage erected by John Morris. In 1802, Calvert Richard Jones was living there, but by 1823, it had been the home of the late A.W. Gregory and in 1847, it was bought by John Henry Vivian for his eldest son, Henry and daughter-in-law, Jessie, who  tragically died in childbirth a year later, leaving Henry distraught. He vowed never to live there again and the house fell into ruin. St Pauls' Church nearby was built as a memorial to her. Henry moved back to Singleton and eventually married twice more.

 

           Gabriel Powell's suvey of Gower in 1764, records that William Rosser lived at an old farm called Wern Eynon and was a tenant  of the Earl of Warwick  in 1764, although other sources aver that  the Squire of Kilvrough, Rawleigh Dawkin, left it in 1749 to his brother Mansel Mansel, who built New Hall on the site in about 1758, which later became known as Sketty Hall. After his days, it lay empty until John Morris who  had lived at 'Clasemont', moved in around 1772. Yates's map of 1799, shows that Ralph Sheldon, who was  John Morris's agent and a trustee of the Turnpike Road Act for Glamorgan in 1785, was in residence. The Rev. John Oldisworth noted in his 1802 'Swansea Guide,' that  Richard Mansell Philipps was living there; in 1822 Charles Baring moved in, purchasing it plus forty acres and the home farm for £5,000. In 1831, he sold to William Jenkins, who sold the home farm and twenty-four acres to the industrialist, John Henry Vivian and the house and remaining twenty-five acres to  Lewis Weston Dillwyn. In the 1860s, Thomas Rees of Waterloo Street, settled there as his retirement home; then Frank Yeo, followed by Richard Glynn. During the second world war, the building became the Head Quarters for the local Air Raid Precautions and in 1947, it was taken over by the British Iron and Steel Research Association, until recently. 


         The Earl of Warwick held the Barony of Sketty, which was wholly within the parish of Swansea, but part of which, he sold to Sir John Morris in 1771, who had moved from Sketty Hall to his newly-acquired estate at Sketty Park, which comprised twenty-two farms and extensive parkland. He built the house in an impressionable position overlooking Swansea Bay c.1818 from a design by William Jernegan, using materials from Clasemont House, which the family had left previously, due to the pollution in the Swansea valley. During the second world war, it was taken over as a Civil Defence Centre, but was demolished in the early 1960s to make way for the modern Sketty Park Estate. In 1764, John Harry was 'holding a small court before his house on The Bryn, Sketty', for a yearly rent of six pence.

          Sketty Isaf was a farm overlooking the Clyne River and the shore. In the eighteenth century it was leased until 1803 by  Sir Francis Holbourne. During the next few years  it was replaced by a mansion house and  had several occupants, but was advertised for sale in The Illustrated London News in 1846. Charles Henry Smith first leased it before purchasing the freehold. By 1868, it was let to Jeremiah Clarke Richardson,  a member of the industrialist family. 

         

          The section of 'our' road from the Bryn to Blackpill would be diverted three times in the years to come. In 1804, the Mumbles Railway was inaugurated to carry limestone from Mumbles to Swansea, with  a branch line up Clyne Valley as far as Ynys to serve Sir John Morris's works, but cutting across the 'road to Lower Sketty.'

 

In the 1830s, the road was again diverted on the section between the Bryn and Blackpill 'through the land of J.H. Vivian.' The Cambrian published a notice on 11th March 1826, to the effect that 'an order was signed by Sir John Morris Bart., and David tennant Esq., two of his Majesty's Justices of the Peace . . . for diverting  and turning a certain part of the Highway and Footpath . . . lying between a certain common or piece of waste land called 'The Bryn' on the road to Sketty . . . and the road leading from the town of Swansea to a certain place called Blackpill . . . for the length of 673 yards . . . and for diverting and turning a certain branch of the said highway . . . of the length of 344 yards  . . . also described in the said Order . . . so as to make the said highway more commodious for the public. . . . and for making in lieu of the said Highway  . . . through the lands of Thomas Morris of Sketty  . . .  who hath consented thereto, a new highway and footpath of 345 yards length and breadth of 24 feet'.

 

          In 1867, Victoria Station, owned by the Llanelly Railway and Dock Company, opened, its route travelling along a shore-side embankment and over a bridge high above the  road at Blackpill, cutting off and causing yet another deviation to 'our' old road, This section is now known as Derwen Fawr Road. 

Roman Bridge, Blackpill

Photo: Stuart Bishop

The Blackpill river, which formed the boundary between the two Manors or Parishes of Oystermouth and Swansea, was connected by a 'Roman-style' bridge, which facilitated the transport of goods. The Bridge was strategically placed and crossed the river very near the Mill, which would have been one of the most important amenities for the community,  where people would take their grain to be milled, and adjacent to  some 'winnowing gardens' where the grain would have been separated from the chaff. The mill had been built near the boundary of the Manor of Oystermouth and not in the middle, as it was the only place close enough to a good water source to power its wheel.

Blackpill Mill

 Blackpill mill is first mentioned  in 1319, but appears again in 1369 when the Reeve was Thomas Griffiths, the value of the mill was £1..18s..5d and the sale of the grain was £6..4s..2d. 

          The mill was described in the Cromwellian Survey of 1650 as 'a water gristmill called Blacke-pill mill lyeing unto the seaside vat xijli p annui £12, which pmisses the tenant houlds by agreement between him and the Earle of Worcester for the tearme of xxj yeares to begin from 4 November 1639 under the yearely  rent of xli and xxli fine.'

         

          The bridge itself  was again in evidence in 1676, when Morgan Jone (sic) the Miller at Blackpill Mill and one of the Constables of the Oystermouth Manor, was  charged with 'annoyance of the highway by suffering water to pass out of its course' and was given one month to put right his errant leat or be fined 6s..8d.  In 1680, he was again before the court 'for want of scouring of the trouch of Blackpill, whereby the road is become very bad (sic) . . . which ought to be scoured at the charge of Morgan John (his proper name), the Miller,  the watercourse at Brockholl into the highway leading to Blackpill bridge . . . to be scoured by a month's time on pain of 10s. . . ' The bridge  continued  in a delapidated state until 1681, when the Surveyors for the Oystermouth Leet Court reported that it was in dire need of repair and recorded that, 'A common bridge over a certain common river called Blackpill river, as much of the said bridge as lyeth in the parish of Oystermouth within the said manor, is out of repair to the common annoyance of His Majesty's people passing that way and ought to be repaired by the inhabitants of the said parish.'

       But there were complications, as the bridge spanned the Blackpill river, which bordered the two Parishes of Oystermouth and Swansea (Sketty only became a separate parish in 1851) and, as the unit of local government at that time was the Parish, each one was only prepared to repair its half. The work on the Oystermouth half was supposed to be finished within two months, but five years later the Oystermouth locals were ordered to repair the rails on their half, which still remained unfinished. Could this be the same 'Roman' bridge which we see today or its replacement. Or Perhaps reaching back through the Victorian, Georgian, Stuart, Tudor and Plantagenet periods and beyond? 

          Other Millers at Blackpill down through the years, included David Thomas Rosser. 1650, Henry Tucker, 1733,  Luke Bell, 1816, William Rosser, 1820, James Grove, 1825,  Enoch Morgan 1838, David Morgan, 1855,  Enoch Morgan Jr. 1870, John Williams, 1867 and 1873, David Morgan, 1891, William Davies, 1895, and William Rich, 1899.  There was only one Millwright recorded, who would have maintained the mill and he was Lewis Lewis, recorded in 1820. The building saw hundreds of years service and was only demolished in the mid twentieth century, although it does not seem to have been in operation later than  about 1895.

          As well as the mill and the castle, other industries gave employment to the locality. Coal was mined in Clyne Valley for many years, there was a brick works, arsenic was manufactured in Clyne Woods and furnaces made naphtha from timber.   

The two granite gate posts, which mark the route of the 'old' road,
situated outside the Lodge to Clyne Gardens

Photo: John Powell, 2017  

The road, as marked on the Oystermouth Tithe map of 1844, wound its way past the mill, through two granite gate posts (probably later additions) up through 'Brinne lane, which is one of the most pleasant   and prettiest roads  . . . the trees from each side meeting', to the cross roads at Cwm Bach, the home of Dr. Robert Hancorne in 1869; then, passing Mayals Green cottages,where, nearby in 1650, 'Katherine Price, a widow had a messuage and thirty-five acres of land for which she paid 11s..5d per year'; onwards to Higher Broadparks,  over the Washing Lake (lake being the old Gower dialect word  for stream) to a T-junction (near today's Woodland Avenue) half way between Upper Boarspit and Gowers Cross farm, occupied in 1650 by  David Gibbs who  had 'a messuage and twenty-four acres of lands' for which he paid 16 shillings per year to the Earl of Worcester. 

         

          The route to Oystermouth Castle was found by turning left at the T-junction towards Gower's Cross farm and the later West Cross House (now the site of the Welsh School) and then immediately right to Norton along, what is now West Cross Avenue, passing some farm buildings; Norton Villa, the home in the Regency period of  Capt. Charles Andrews of the 24th Regiment of Infantry  and his wife, Harriet,  before they moved to  the aforementioned West Cross House; passing  the public houses, The Three Salmons, with landlady, Mary Jenkins (1830); the Beaufort Inn  with landlord, John Hulbert (1873-4), Mathew Wright at the Dove, (1830); William Jordan was a tenant at Forge Field near  the 18 acre Coultshill [sic] Farm, which had been worked back in 1650,  by Charles Lloyd and Robert Bydder.

A painting which includes the Coltstill Farmhouse and fields.

Ronald Austin collection 

Coltshill Farm ruins

Photo: John Powell, 2017  

Much of that land was quarried away by the Norton Quarry and Limeworks Company and only the ruins of Coltshill farm remain today, secluded in a copse at the corner of Oystermouth cemetery. 

Oystermouth Castle

Photo: Stuart Bishop

Tim Webborn occupied the 'Pound' field, where stray animals were kept (just outside today's Oystermouth School).

            Thence onwards to Oystermouth Castle, which was founded by William de Londres shortly after 1106, following the capture and colonisation of the south of Gower by the Normans. After several retakings  by the Welsh and the Normans in turn, in 1220 Henry III returned the Barony of Gower to John de Braose, who rebuilt both Swansea and Oystermouth castles. Dated 1400-1, the accounts of Sir Hugh de Waterton, record that he received on behalf 'of the Lord', arrears of 103s..6d for the preceeding year, from John ap Gruffuth  'the Reeve there', and two sums of  £29..10s and  24s..8d from the following year's Reeve, William Mathew.

            Following the long period of turmoil,the castle, now an unnecessary defence, gradually fell to ruins until, in 1650, it was being described in Cromwell's Survey of Gower as ' an old decayed castle beinge for the psent [sic] of noe vse, but for a very pleasant scituacon [sic]  and near vnto the seaside: it is lett by lease vnto Richard Seys Esq. . .  and digging coales in Clyn fforest, ' rent for the total of  his 133 acres being £5..10s..0d; Thomas Lloyd  was leasing eight acres from the Earle of Worcester, at a rent of £5..12s..0d, which comprised 'three parcells of arrable land lyeinge all together next the castle and abuttinge vppon the land from New Crosses to Norton . . .'[sic]  George Robin, John William and John Madocke  also had property at Norton.

          In 1764,  Gabriel Powell's Survey of Gower recorded that 'Mary Davies held  by lease all that ruinous castle  . . . comprising eleven acres at a rent, payable to the Duke of Beaufort, of 5/- per annum, plus two fat pullets or 1/- in lieu'.

          The first Constable to the castle was Sir Hugh Johnys, a Welsh Knight, who was appointed in 1451, giving him forty acres of demesne land at Oystermouth. William Collier was the 'Castle Warden' in 1830, John Balsdon was 'Keeper' in 1864 and Mr Boulston [sic] was 'Keeper' in 1869.


          In the eighteenth and nineteenth century, the ruined castle and its grounds came to be seen as a picturesque backdrop and tourist attraction with painters and photgraphers arriving to capture the scene. Many events were organised there, such as one  in July 1850 when  'a monster tea party took place at the old castle . . . in aid of the funds of the Baptist Chapel. Around 1,100 partook of tea and the ominbuses has [sic] quite a harvest.' another in July 1860 when there was a public tea party on the occasion of the re-opening of Mount Zion Chapel; in May 1864, the First Glamorgan Artillery under Capt. Francis 'enjoyed a meal and polka ' there and  in August 1881, the Swan Street Band of Hope (Mount Pleasant Church) from Swansea travelled by the Oystermouth railway and held a tea in the Castle grounds.

          But the most distinguished of visitors had arrived many years before on December 10th 1284, when King Edward I and  Queen Eleanor were entertained as guests  of William de Braose in a bid to pacify and subjugate the Welsh. A story is told that the castle was being prepared for the arrival of the Queen's new baby, but it did not arrive in time before they had to travel on to Caernarvon where the baby Edward, their fourth son who would eventually become Prince of Wales and Edward II, was born. However, the truth is that the baby was born at Caernarvon Castle but, some eight months before the visit on 25 April!

          In May 1648, the minute book of the Swansea Corporation recorded that  'came into this towne (Oystermouth?) the truly Honorable Oliver Cromwell Esq., Lifftenant Gennerall of all the forces of this Kingdome of England' [sic] who was described as 'Lord of this towne, the Seigniory of Gower and Mannor Killvay.' C.W. Slater in his book The Corner Pew, written in 1919, commented whimsically that 'Midway between the Glen and the bay . . . stands the castle where Oliver Cromwell did not place his cannon.' Did he visit Oystermouth or Swansea or both? Of course, there is also another periodic visitor - the Ghost reputedly seen by Edmund Keen in November 1870 and reported by the Cambrian.

          The Cambrian  of 1 December 1810, carried news that 'an Edward IV groat, crucifix and religious statues had been found among the ruins of the castle'.

Old time has wrought his changes within the civic scene,

The ancient castle crumbles, and to the village green

The stretching arms extending unto the woods of Clyne

Have scattered newer homesteads around the curve divine.

E. Howard Harris Change and the Changeless, 1926

 

In the ninety-plus years since Mr. Harris wrote his poem depicting the spread of building, the advance of housing from 'east to west' has continued relentlessly, especially post the Second World War. Some of the houses such as Sketty Park, Veranda, St Helen's, Park Wern and the mills at Brynmill and Blackpill, have disappeared from the landscape, but others have been put to new uses e.g. Heathfield House is a home for senior citizens, Singleton Abbey has become part of Swansea University and  Sketty Hall is now a restaurant and conference centre. The massive house-building programmes of the twentieth century at Sketty, West Cross and Newton, have covered many of the fields. However, 'our' road, which has been travelled along  by countless people for nigh on a thousand years, still wends its way for the most part from College Street (West Strete) to Oystermouth Castle.

POST SCRIPT

In 2012, the Glamorgan Gwent Archaeological Trust excavated an ancient oak and elder wooden roadway at right angles to  the shore just off Norton, which has now been carbon-dated to the Bronze age of  3,000 years ago.

         It  is just possible that  this is a vestige of  a far more ancient road, which perhaps had continued two thousand years before 'our' road, from the pre-Swansea area, through Norton Cross down to the present-day shore and out on to the marshland towards the River  Severn, when the shoreline was far different to today's.

The Bronze Age wooden roadway being excavated, just off Norton, by the G. G. Archaeological Trust
Gorge Yates's Map of Glamorgan, 1799
Published by J. Cary, 21 May 1799
(West Glamorgan Archive WGAS D/D Z  134/3)

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John Jones St Helen’s House

https://museum.wales/articles/2015-11-27/Welsh-participation-in-the-development-of-Britains-maritime-empire/

A version of this article was published in The Swansea History Journal  No. 26. 2018-2019

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