Bettws-Yn-Rhôs, otherwise Bettwsaber-Gelau - From 'A Topographical Dictionary of Wales' (1849) BETTWS-YN-RHÔS, otherwise BETTWSABER-GELAU, a parish, in the union of St. Asaph, hundred of Isdulas, county of Denbigh, North Wales, 4 miles (S. S. W.) from Abergele; containing 911 inhabitants. The village is pleasantly situated at the base of a lofty mountain, by which it is sheltered on one side, and has a fine opening towards the north, commanding a full view of the Irish Sea. About a quarter of a mile from the village is a copious chalybeate spring, which was much resorted to some years since, but its efficacy has been greatly weakened by the influx of other waters. Coed Côch, the seat of John Lloyd Wynne, Esq., is a splendid mansion, with an elegant portico of five fluted columns of Penrhŷn slate stone. Fairs are held on February 20th, May 8th, August 15th, and November 20th. The living is a discharged vicarage, rated in the king's books at £12. 15. 5.; patron and appropriator, the Bishop of St. Asaph. The appropriate tithes have been commuted for a rent-charge of £180. 3.2., and the vicarial for one of £398. 12. 10., with a glebe of six acres and a half, valued at £9 per annum, and a house: the parish clerk likewise receives £8 per annum as a commutation. The old church, dedicated to St. Michael, was, previously to the Reformation, a chapel of ease to Abergele; a very neat new church, containing 428 sittings, was erected in 1839. There are places of worship for Calvinistic and Wesleyan Methodists.
A National school has been erected by subscription, aided by a grant of £39 from the National Society, in which about forty children from this and the adjoining parishes receive gratuitous instruction. The school is supported partly by a small subscription, and partly by a rental of £10 issuing from a tenement and thirty-seven acres, called Aelwyd Uchâv, assigned on the inclosure of waste lands. The master also receives part of the rental of three other tenements, called Gydar, Dôlwyd Bâch, and Rhŷd-y-Saeson, in the parish of Llansantfraid-glanConway, amounting to £33. 10., of which the remainder is divided among the poor in clothing and money on St. Thomas' day. This property contains above twenty-nine acres, and was purchased in 1729, for £180, the produce of various bequests, and of subscriptions from Dr. Jones, the then vicar, and other individuals. Altogether, with the fees from some pay-scholars, the master has an income of above £40 per annum; exclusively of a house and garden rent-free. The Rev. Robert Anwyl, vicar of the parish, who died in 1816, bequeathed £300, the interest to be applied for the benefit of the school, on the death of a party who was sixty-five years of age in 1836. There are also three Sunday schools, conducted by gratuitous teachers; one is in connexion with the Established Church, and the other two with the dissenters. A rent-charge of ten shillings on Pen-y-bryn farm is applied for the benefit of the poor. Another of £5, charged by Mrs. Griffiths on Pen-fordd-deg farm, was given up in 1832, by a resolution of the vestry, who consented to receive £100 from the present possessor as compensation: of this sum, £54. 13. 4. were expended in erecting four cottages on a parish allotment, at present inhabited by paupers; and the residue, £45. 6. 8., was applied towards rebuilding the house on Dôlwyd Bâch farm, destroyed by fire.
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