HAWARDEN, commonly pronounced Harden, is a small manufacturing town,
seated near the estuary of the river Dee, and on the mail coach road from
Chester to Holyhead. Tiles and coarse earthen wares are made here, and
manufactories are established of Glauber’s salts, sal ammoniac, and ivory
black, besides which it possesses an extensive iron foundery. A rail
road extending to the water’s edge enables the manufacturer to export his
goods with facility. In the legendary history of this place its
inhabitants are styled “Harden Jews,” the origin of which epithet is
explained by the following curious tale. In the year 946, Cynan ap Ellis
ap Anarawd, being king of Gwynedd or North Wales, there stood a christian
temple here, to which a rood-loft was attached, containing an image of
the Virgin bearing a large cross in the hands and called the Holy Rood.
The summer of this year proving unaccountably hot and dry, the Hardeners
prayed to the Holy Rood for rain, and Lady Trawst, the wife of Sytsylt,
governor of the castle, was one of the most constant in her supplications
to the image. One day, when this devout lady was on her knees before the
figure, the large cross fell down, and killed her on the spot. The
Hardeners, previously chagrined at the indifference of the Holy Rood to
their fervent entreaties, the weather continuing as warm as before,
determined to bring the image to trial for the murder of the unfortunate
Lady Trawst. This ceremony was solemnly performed, and the criminal
being brought in guilty, was, by the majority, sentenced to be _hanged_.
Spar of Mancot, one of the jurymen, thought _drowning_ would be the most
suitable mode of destruction, as their prayers were offered on a watery
subject. Another, Corbin, suggested that it would be sufficient to lay
the image down upon the beach and leave the rest to fate. The latter
suggestion was embraced, and the Holy Rood being placed upon the sands
was carried, by the flow of the tide, gently up to the walls of Chester,
as the legend has it, _drowned_ and dead. The citizens of Chester
immediately took it up, interred it on the spot, and set up a monument
with this inscription:
The Jews their God did crucify,
The Hardeners theirs did drown,
Because their wants she’d not supply,
And lies under this cold stone.
A farther honour was paid to the insulted image by the inhabitants of
Chester, whose river, formerly called the Usk, was henceforward
denominated Rood Die, or Dee.
[Picture: Hawarden Castle; Aberglasslynn; St. Asaph. London. Published
by T. T. & J. Tegg, Cheapside, Oct. 1st 1832]
Harden Castle was occupied by Fitzvarlin, a Norman adventurer, soon after
the conquest; it was next the seat of the Barons Mont-Alt, stewards of
the palatinate of Chester; and, upon the extinction of that title in
1237, was resumed by the crown. In the year 1267 it was restored to the
Mont-Alt family by Llewellyn, Prince of Wales, with an injunction
restraining them from erecting a fortress here for the space of thirty
years. David, the brother of Llewellyn, violating that allegiance which
he had so often sworn, surprised and took the castle, upon Palm Sunday,
in the year 1281, and cruelly butchered the brave little garrison. From
the death of David the Mont-Alt family retained the possession for
upwards of fifty years, when Robert, the last baron, conveyed it to
Isabella, the queen of Edward the Second, and upon her disgrace it again
became crown property.
In 1336 it was granted, by Edward the Third to Montacute, Earl of
Salisbury, in which noble house it continued till 1400, when John, making
an insurrectionary movement in favour of his deposed master Richard the
Second, was beheaded by the townspeople of Leicester. The crown once
more resumed possession of this fortress upon John of Salisbury’s
attainder.
Thomas, Duke of Clarence, who fell at the battle of Baugy in 1420, had a
grant of Harden Castle, and was succeeded in the tenure by Sir Thomas
Stanley, who held it until the year 1420, when it was again resumed by
the crown, and granted to Edward, Prince of Wales.
About this time also an inquisition was held, when it was found that
John, Earl of Salisbury, having alienated this estate previous to his
attainder, his surviving feoffee was legally entitled to enter, and
repossess the same. A few years after the Stanley family appear to have
been the proprietors, and it was also at one time the property of
Margaret, mother of Henry the Seventh. Upon the execution of the Earl of
Derby in 1601, this, together with his other possessions were
sequestrated, and sold by the agents of the sequestration to Mr. Serjeant
Glynn, in whose family it still continues. The ruins of the castle are
inconsiderable, it was dismantled in the general destruction of
fortresses by the Parliamentarians, and was further dilapidated by one of
its proprietors. The present owner allows it the enjoyment of that
respect which is generally felt towards a venerable ruin, and is himself
a constant resident in a stately family mansion erected at a little
distance from the remnants of the ancient castle. The family of Maude
take the title of viscounts from this parish.