VALUABLE RECORDS

Evening Post, Issue 45, 22 February 1936, Page 7

VALUABLE RECORDS

HOUSED IN LIBRARY

OLD WELSH CHARTER

The original charter granted by Edward I in 1284 to the town of Rhuddlan, in Flintshire, bearing the seal and signature of the great Plantagenet, has just been deposited in the National Library of Wales by RearAdmiral Rowley-Conway, of Bodrhyddan, now Lord Lieutenant of Flintshire, states the "Manchester Guardian." It was a Conway of Bodrhyddan who was appointed first Constable of King Edward's new castle and borough of Rhuddlan, and the charter has remained in the custody of the family ever since. Bodrhyddan, a beautiful mansion, stands in romantic country a mile or so from Rhuddlan, and local tradition supports the surmise that the original dwelling on the site housed King Edward and his Court during the building of the castle. The name Bodrhyddan is held by learned authorities to ■> derive from "Bod Derwyddon," the abode of the Druids. The hall was rebuilt in 1596, renovated a hundred yards later, and finally remodelled in 1874. For several centuries the Conways were lords of the manor of Prestatyn as well as that of Rhuddlan.

With the Rhuddlan charter there had been deposited at Aberystwyth valuable records of the manor and lordship as well as other deeds and documents that should be of extreme interest to historians, and especially to the future compiler of the 'longawaited standard history of Flintshire. The manorial records include a copy of the roll of the leet court, 1732, court books for 1794-1841, and accounts of boundary perambulations wherein may be traced the beginnings jof Rhyl on the salt marshes that formed the northern fringes of the old borough. A FAMOUS TRIAL. About fifty deeds are included. They date from 1606 to 1792 and relate to properties in Caerwys, Holywell, and Hope in Flintshire; Wrexham and Llanrhaiadr-yn-Cymeirch in Denbighshire; and also in London and the West Indies, where in the eighteenth century a daughter of Sir John Conway, Lady Stapleton, owned a sugar plantation at St. Christopher's. It was Lady Stapleton's granddaughter who became the wife of Dean Shipley, of St. Asaph, hero of the famous sedition trial in 1784. Dr. Shipley, as a member of the Flintshire Constitutional Society, had published a pamphlet advocating Parliamentary reform. The pamphlet itself had been written by the Dean's brother-in-law, Sir William Jones, the eminent Oriental scholar, afterwards a Judge of the Bengal Supreme Court. Dr. Shipley, as publisher, had to stand trial at Shrewsbury Assizes for seditious" libel against the Government of George 111. But the verdict was "Guilty of publishing, but whether a libel or not the jury jdo not find," and the Dean was disi charged. The trial proved to be one of the most famous struggles in British constitutional history, and its result led to Fox's Libel Act of 1791, which established the liberty of the Press under the guardianship of British juries.

Through his marriage Dean Shipley was intimately- associated with Bodrhyddan affairs and was part-owner of the dependent Bryn Yorcin and Perkinsey (locally known as "Aberkinsey") estates. He is believed to have been, responsible for an inscription that has been gazed upon by many thousands of tourists and sightseers claiming for a wall on Rhuddlan High Street that it was part of the "Parliament House" where Edward 1 promulgated the Statute of Rhuddlan in 1284, but what basis existed for the claim is not known and the Dean's view is not in general acceptance today. LADIES OF LLANGOIXEN. The Bodrhyddan manuscripts, photostat copies of which will in due time be available at the library for accredited historical and literary research workers, include a letter from one of the famous "Ladies of Llangollen," Miss Sarah Ponsonby, to Miss Williams Wynn, of Wynnstay. The Wyn:istay and Bodrhyddan families became connected through the marriage of Dean Shipley's son, Colonel Shipley, to a sister of Sir Watkin Williams Wynn, and it is a further interesting circumstance that the daughter of this marriage became the wife of Bishop Heber,. of Calcutta, author of that well-known hymn "From Greenland's Icy Mountains." Local tradition avers that the hymn was written while the Bishop was on a visit to Bodrhyddan and was first sung at a missionary meeting at Rhuddlan.""