Llanbedr-Dyffryn-Clwyd

Llanbedr (Llan-Bedr-Dyffryn-Clwyd) - From 'A Topographical Dictionary of Wales' (1849)
LLANBEDR (LLAN-BEDR-DYFFRYN-CLWYD), a parish, in the union and hundred of Ruthin, county of Denbigh, North Wales, 2 miles (N. E.) from Ruthin, on the road to Chester; containing 522 inhabitants. This parish is bounded on the north by that of Llangynhaval, on the south by Llanrhûdd, on the east by Llanverras, and on the west by Llanrhûdd and Llanynys. It is about three miles in length and two in breadth, and comprises by computation 1700 acres of cultivated, and 1200 of uncultivated land, of the former of which about 1000 acres are arable, and 700 meadow and pasture, with a small extent of wood. The soil on the higher grounds is light and sandy, but more loamy on the lower. The surface presents the various features of mountain and plain; and the environs, in which are some handsome seats, partake of the scenery which characterizes the beautiful Vale of Clwyd: the seats are, the ancient mansion of Llanbedr Hall, romantically situated at the foot of the hills; and the house of Berth. Many attempts have been made, and considerable sums of money expended, in the expectation of finding coal, but they have been unavailing; the miners having mistakenly regarded the bituminous siliceous shale with which the soil abounds, as indicative of coal. Small portions of manganese have been discovered, but so much mixed with pyrites of iron as to be of little value.

The living is a rectory, rated in the king's books at £13. 1. 8.; patron, the Bishop of Bangor: the tithes have been commuted for a rent-charge of £415; and there is a glebe-house, with a glebe of eleven acres and a half valued at £20 per annum. The church, dedicated to St. Peter, is a small neat edifice in the later style of English architecture; it is delightfully situated on a gentle eminence within the park of Llanbedr, and forms a pleasing and picturesque object, as seen through the embowering woods by which it is surrounded. There is a place of worship in the parish for Wesleyans. A Church daily school is supported; and two Sunday schools are held, one of them belonging to the Wesleyans, the other to the Calvinistic Methodists. The interest of several charitable bequests amounting in the aggregate to £270, is annually distributed among the poor at Christmas: among the benefactors may be mentioned Simon Thelwall, of Gray's Inn; Edward Evans, who left to the parish the tenement and land called Tyny-Nant; and the Rev. Hugh Pugh, whose bequest of £6, made in 1681, now produces £23. 17. 6. per annum, which is equally divided between this and the parishes of Llanvwrog and Ruthin, conformably with the will of the testator.

On the summit of Moel Venlli, one of the Clwydian mountains, which is 1722 feet in height, is an extensive British camp, comprising an area of sixtythree acres, surrounded by a double vallum and intrenchment, and additionally defended on the eastern or English side by a triple fosse. The ascent to this station, which is so strongly guarded on every side as anciently to have been impregnable, is by a circuitous path round the western side of the mountain. A portion of the inner gate is still remaining. The camp appears to have been occupied by the Romans after their conquest of this part of the principality: military weapons used by that people have been discovered at various times; and in 1816, more than 1500 Roman coins, principally denarii, were found nearly in the centre of the camp. Moel Gaer, a small hill near Moel Venlli, is strongly fortified with a single dyke, which entirely surrounds its summit; this appears to have been an outwork to the camp or principal station of Venlli. Immediately above Moel Gaer is Moel Vammau, another of the Clwydian mountains, and the loftiest in that magnificent chain; it is 1852 feet in height. On its summit the gentlemen of Denbighshire and Flintshire erected, in commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the accession of George III., a lofty stone structure, comprising a square central tower six yards in length on each side, and thirty-nine feet high, flanked at each angle with a square tower of the same dimensions and elevation. From the central tower, and resting partly on the angular towers, rises a square tower of larger dimensions, to the height of forty feet, surmounted by an obelisk thirty-six feet high. This structure, commonly called the Jubilee Column, occupies a base eighteen yards square: the angular towers are solid, but the central tower on the basement is perforated with an arch, and it was intended to construct a staircase leading from this archway to the larger tower above. The building is altogether 115 feet in height, and, from its commanding situation, is a prominent and very imposing object in the views from all the high grounds in the neighbouring counties; it is seen from the city of Chester, from Liverpool, and other distant places, and forms a conspicuous and well-known landmark for vessels navigating the Irish Sea.