The Hawarden Visitors Hand-Book | Page 5

in case of need. Overhead probably lay the roadway for horsemen with a proper drawbridge. The thickness of the walls indicates their having been built to a considerable height, sufficient probably to form parapets masking the passage of the bridge.
In the mound beyond, or counterscarp, was the gate-house and Barbican, containing a curious fan-shaped chamber up a flight of steps. While the earth-works surrounding the Castle are the oldest part of the fortifications--possibly, thinks Mr. Clark, of the tenth century--the dressed masonry and the different material of the Barbican and Dungeon- pit, together with some of the exterior offices, show them to be of somewhat later date than the main building. They have, in fact, as Mr. Clark remarks, more of an unfinished than a partially destroyed appearance. The squared and jointed stones, so easily removable and ready to hand, {16} proved no doubt a tempting quarry to subsequent owners of Hawarden, who perhaps shared the faults of a period when neither the architectural nor historical value of ancient remains was generally appreciated.
It now remains to trace the history of the Castle, so far as it is known to us.
In 1264 a memorable conference took place within its walls between Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, and Llewelyn, Prince of North Wales, at which each promised to aid the other in promoting the execution of their respective plans. The King, who, with the Prince of Wales, was the Earl's prisoner, was compelled to renounce his rights, and the Castle was given up to Llewelyn. On the suppression of de Montfort's rebellion the Castle reverted to the Crown, and Llewelyn was called upon by the Papal Legate, Ottoboni, to surrender it. This he at first declined, but being deserted by the Earl, who at the same time, in order to put an end to the conflict, offered to him his daughter Eleanor in marriage agreed afterwards to a treaty by which the Castle was to be destroyed, and Robert de Montalt to be reinstated in the possession of his lands in Hawarden, but to be restrained from restoring the fortification for thirty years.
This stipulation appears to have been violated, for in 1281 the Welsh rebelled, and under David and Llewelyn (who then made up their quarrel), an attack was made by night upon the Castle, then styled Castrum Regis, which was successful. Roger de Clifford, Justiciary of Chester, was taken prisoner, and the Castle with much bloodshed and cruelty stormed and partly burnt on Palm Sunday. The outrage was repeated in the next year (Nov. 6th, 1282), when the Justice's elder son, also Roger Clifford, was slain. Soon after this Llewelyn died, Wales was entirely subjugated, and David executed as a traitor.
To this period may most probably be assigned the present structure. A Keep, such as that now standing is not likely to have been successfully assaulted in two successive years; nor does internal evidence favour the idea that it was the actual work taken by the Welsh. Robert, the last of the Montalts, was a wealthy man, and in all probability it was during his Lordship, between 1297 and 1329, that the Castle, as we now see it, was built. Though the unusual thickness of the walls of the Keep might be thought more in keeping with the Norman period, the general details, as already stated, the polygonal mural gallery and interior, and the entrance, evidently parts of the original work, are very decidedly Edwardian.
Of the subsequent history of the Castle, we have unfortunately nothing to record until we come to the Civil War between Charles the First and the Parliament. On Nov. 11th, 1643, Sir William Brereton, who had declared for the Parliament, appeared with his adherents at Hawarden Castle, where he was welcomed by Robert Ravenscroft and John Aldersey, who had charge of it in the name of the King. Sir William established himself in the Castle, and harassed the garrison of Chester, which was for the King, by cutting off the supplies of coals, corn and other provisions, which they had formerly drawn from the neighbourhood. Meanwhile the Archbishop of York, writing from Conway to the Duke of Ormond announced the betrayal of the Castle and appealed for assistance. In response to this a force from Ireland was landed at Mostyn in the same month, and employed to reduce the fortress, garrisoned by 120 men of Sir Thomas Middleton's Regiment. The garrison received by a trumpet a verbal summons to surrender, which gave occasion to a correspondence, followed by a further and more peremptory summons from Captain Thomas Sandford, which ran as follows:--
Gentlemen: I presume you very well know or have heard of my condition and disposition; and that I neither give nor take quarter. I am now with my Firelocks (who never yet neglected opportunity to