Bethesda to Cwm Eigiau: Tracing a Fatal Journey

On January 9th, 1865, three men set off from Bangor to walk to the Cwm Eigiau quarry, some 500 metres above sea level on the edge of the Carneddau mountains. It seems likely that they had left the quarry on the Saturday to spend Sunday at home with their families and attending church, before returning on Monday. They had been travelling back and forth between the two places for around two months, working at fitting up machinery at the quarry, so this must have been a familiar journey for them. Walking across the high Carneddau in the depths of winter, though, can easily be fatal when the weather is bad.

Watch a video of the walk here.

The men started from Bangor; they worked at the Menai Foundry in Hirael, a business which belonged to John Owen & Co. until the 1950s, but is now National Tyres & Autocare. William Jones, 44, was a smith. Owen Jones, 50, was a millwright; in the 1861 census he’s described as a ‘pattern maker in the iron foundry’. William Owen was also a millwright, the son of the boss.

They reached Bethesda through a combination of walking and lifts, stopping at Halfway-house for a glass of ale. On reaching Bethesda they took two or three glasses at the Ship Inn (the location of the Ship is uncertain), before passing through the Pant Dreiniog quarry - now a grassed area tight against the centre of Bethesda. William Jones having bought 3 shillings worth of rum in the Ship Inn, for the road, as it were, they then stopped at the George Inn - Y Sior - for more ale, and a bite to eat of the food they had in their pockets.

Y Siôr, on the Carneddi Road, Bethesda. I'd hoped to be able to drop in for a drink - non-alcoholic - but this wouldn't have been practical with the dogs, and even less practical since the place doesn't open until 4 on a Friday. The then landlady of the George Inn, Mrs Parry, remembered the men's visit and described William Jones as 'a little worse for drink.' Owen Jones, although he had drunk as least as much, did not seem to be affected.

When they left the inn it had started to rain heavily. William Jones popped back to light his pipe and left the other two men waiting outside; after a time William Owen went to fetch him, and found him sitting by the fire chattering with the landlady. (The accounts aren't entirely clear as to whether this was the landlady of the George Inn, or another house.)

 

We walked up out of Bethesda on a beautiful, fresh spring day, that must have been vastly different to the freezing rain that the three men encountered in 1865. Some of great slate quarries can be seen in the distance. A quick glance at the 1861 census shows the majority of people living here were employed as slate quarrymen. We passed a man on the walk up here who said 6000 people used to be employed in the quarries.

 

 

 Either we slightly missed our way here, or, I think, it was just that the footpath access wasn't great. Two footpaths converge here and we were coming up the path that goes through the gate just out of sight on the right of the picture, not up the defined track on the left. The gate was padlocked closed. Next time I think the other route might be easier. It seemed rather apt, though, that this route took us past a tiny hillfort called Pen y Gaer, since we live under the shadow of the larger Pen y Gaer on the other side of the mountains.

 

 

Looking back down over Bethesda, and, I think, over the site of the Pant Dreiniog Quarry, which you could hardly tell was once an industrial landscape.

Passing Moel Faban, with its traces of Iron Age settlement.

Walking up the track past the hills Llefn and Gyrn. The newspaper articles relating the story of the three men refer to the 'Llanbedr Road' - where the path splits either side of Carnedd Gwenllian to take you either down to Llanbedr or across to Cwm Eigiau - and looking at the old maps it's easy to discern a whole network of ways that have essentially become lost to the modern world. These paths are used by walkers, but it's apparent that before the advent of the combustion engine and the need for tarmac, in some ways our travel in this area of the world was far less hampered by geographical barriers like mountains. The peaks are criss-crossed with roads, if you're only willing or able to use leg power instead of wheels.

 

 

On the edge of Gyrn, we stopped for a moment's rest in a small quarry. Perhaps the three men might have found shelter here. The accounts tell of the men sheltering in a pen, and of Owen Jones and William Jones begging William Owen for a drop of the rum they had with them, because they were so cold and tired. It sounds as if William Owen had offered to carry the rum because he was afraid of how affected the men were by drink, although there's no testimony to William Owen's level of intoxication. At times he also carried Owen Jones' bag.

 

Walking past Gyrn, which looks as if it were made simply by dropping down a heap of rubble.

 

In places the track up along the side of Drosgl, towards Bera Bach, is very good indeed, and looks as if it's been made to take vehicles of some kind. 

 

Heading up to Bera Bach. If we had been three men making for Cwm Eigiau in a storm, we would have carried on around the edge, but I've never been up Bera Bach before so I decided to go up to the top.

 Looking back down the broad valley towards Bethesda.

 

 

 Reaching the top of Bera Bach, which, like so many of these Carneddau peaks, is littered with fractured stone.

 

 

 It's thought that once the mountains of Eryri were as high as the Himalayas are now, so what we're seeing in these tumbled heaps of stone are the deep insides of once huge mountains, broken down over millennia by the ravages of water and frost.

 

 

 For a long time we didn't feel as if we were gaining much height, but it was a steady climb from Bethesda, and a steeper one past the edge of Drosgl. Suddenly on Bera Bach, 807m, we seemed to be at a proper mountain elevation.

 

 

Looking from Bera Bach towards Carnedd Llewelyn. The newspaper reports about the tragedy made much of the men crossing Carnedd Llewelyn, which is only about 20 metres lower than the top of Yr Wyddfa, but in fact they would have gone around the edge and never got quite that high. The newspapers seem to be using 'Carnedd Llewelyn' as a catch-all for the whole area.

 

 

 Bera Mawr on the left, beyond Bera Bach, with Llwytmor rising beyond. Ironically, Bera Mawr is actually lower than Bera Bach.

 

 I have always loved these dark mountain pools that sit up on the flat peat land between the peaks, with their astonishing range of colour mixing sky blue and a peaty black, the yellow-green reflections of the ravaged grass, and the ochre of slabs of stone.

 

 

 Another mountain pool with a deceptive layer of sediment. Sometimes the dogs plunge into these and discover they're deeper than they expect. In wintery conditions you have to look out for these under the crust of snow.

 

 

 Heading up towards Yr Aryg and leaving Bera Bach behind. The view of Ynys Môn was discernable to the naked eye, and at times we could see the full length of the Menai Strait, but it was so hazy that it's hard to make out in photos.

 

 

 Reaching Yr Aryg, just west of Carnedd Gwenllian (formerly Carnedd Uchaf). Just beyond here the road splits, the left fork taking one down to Pen y Gaer and into Llanbedr, and the right branching off to Cwm Eigiau.

 

 

 The splintered top of Yr Aryg, at 866 metres, isn't regarded as a mountain in its own right, but it feels enough like one when you're up there.

 

 

It's a bleak and beautiful wilderness up here. On the side of Yr Aryg, with Owen Jones out in front, William Jones and William Owen were caught by such a violent squall of wind that it threw them to the ground. William Owen recounted winds that pitched them 'some yards distant,' and spoke of having to cling to the heather to stop himself from being blown away. Once they were passing over the top of the great hump of land and reaching the eastern side, with the cliffs of Dulyn and Melynllyn nearby, there would have been a very real fear of being blown over the drop.

 

 

It seems the trio had passed Yr Aryg, coming to what's described as the '“gate” of the hill', probably where the path splits around Carnedd Gwenllian. They had a discussion on whether they were on the right road, and carried on a little way towards Cwm Eigiau, but somehow William Owen ended up out in front of the other two men. How this happened isn't really addressed. William Owen is supposed to have said 'I made the best of my way, thinking that they would do the same.' It's hard to know if this was a case of being tired of walking with two reluctant travellers, of William Owen simply getting to a point where he was most concerned about his own safety, if they argued about the way, or if they just became separated as each tried to progress through the storm. However it happened, William Owen lost the other two men.

He arrived safely at the Cwm Eigiau quarry by half past five, after night had fallen, no doubt vastly relieved to be somewhere with warmth and shelter at last after a terrifying experience on the hills. The other men didn't arrive. The following Tuesday was too stormy for anyone to venture over the mountain for news, and a letter he wrote on Thursday to report the incident was miscarried. His next letter reached Bangor on Saturday. A succession of men went out searching, including quarrymen from Cwm Eigiau, fifteen men from the Pant Dreiniog quarry with their overseer R Owens, and 35 men from Caebraichcafn quarry with their overseer Mr Francis. John Owen, the owner of the Menai Foundry, also joined search efforts.

 

 

William Jones must have turned back after William Owen became separated. It's unclear whether all three men lost each other or if William Jones and Owen Jones continued together for a while. At any rate, William Jones must have decided to make his way either back towards Bethesda or towards the junction of the roads between Llanbedr and Cwm Eigiau. On Friday, 24th February, forty-six days after he went missing, his body was found on the top of Yr Aryg. He was described as being found ‘lying on a heap of stones, exposed to the storm, without any shelter whatever near him; his eyes and mouth open, his head and back frozen to the ground and a part of one of his shoes torn’. Perhaps he was wandering and lost, because one of the searchers stated that  he was ‘between 100 and 200 yards from the path which would lead him to his destination’. William Jones was buried on Monday, February 27th, in the Bangor New Cemetery. He left behind a widow, and a daughter by a former wife.
 
Owen Jones' body wasn't found until the Sunday, the 2nd of April. Shepherd William Jones from Bron y Gadair, a relatively well-to-do farm nestled under the side of Pen y Gadair above Llanbedr-y-Cennin, went up onto the mountain with a lad and his dogs. They were following the path from Llanbedr to Bethesda, but the dogs apparently caught sight or scent something half a mile away, and raced off over the snow. The lad with them was taken so ill at the sight of the body that the shepherd didn't report the find until the next day. Then he travelled to Bangor, with his dog in tow, to inform John Owen of the Menai Foundry, and the relatives of the dead man. The body was brought down to the Victoria Inn in Bethesda, although it was frozen so hard one witness said it 'was like a piece of solid ice.' An adze had to be used to recover his pocket watch.
 
Owen Jones was buried in the Bangor New Cemetery on the Tuesday following, leaving a widow and seven young children. For their benefit an entertainer known as Professor Whitworth put on one of his 'unequalled entertainments', involving magic, ventriloquism, and 'laughable chemical experiments'. He was advertised as having performed in front of Queen Victoria, the Emperor and Empress of the French, and other crowned heads of Europe, and the performance raised £17.19.7 for the widow and her family. (Professor Whitworth seems to be a story entirely in his own right - read through some fascinating newspaper stories about him here, included his being jailed for larceny, his 'homaeopathic' charitable giving, and his complete inability to speak Welsh.)

Another meandering mountaintop pool.

 

 

Walking towards the edge of Carnedd Gwenllian, looking back towards Yr Aryg.

 

 

 Bethesda is far in the distance now, disappearing into the haze.

 These rocks struck me as we walked around Carnedd Gwenllian, with their vertical splits, but diagonal lines of erosion across them.

 

 After passing Carnedd Gwenllian we were finally on the eastern side of the Carneddau, and we stopped for a bit of lunch. From reading the accounts of the men's crossing it seems that this was where William Owen was battling through raging wind.

 

Although the footpath from Carnedd Gwenllian to Cwm Eigiau is quite clear on the map, it doesn't seem very evident on the ground. The path that passes from Drum over Foel Fras, Carnedd Gwenllian, Foel Grach, and Carnedd Llewlyn shows as a great scar across the tops, but we had to branch off towards the south east. We ended up some way east of the path, I think because of a natural inclination not to gain too much unnecessary height on the edge of Foel Grach. We were far enough from the cliffs of Dulyn and Melynllyn that it wasn't a worry. The land is quite boggy in areas, though.

 

The view down Pant y Griafolen, with Dulyn hidden below the nearby cliffs. It was so hazy that nothing much beyond this edge of the Conwy Valley was visible. 

 

 

Still cutting across the east side of Foel Grach, and the boggy land starts to become punctured with rocks.

 

 

 It seems incredible that such a small stream can carve out such a deep channel through the peat.

 

 

 The land is much drier here, and feels like a very special place to walk through, with all the split rocks scattered over the yellowed grass.

 

 This little series of rocks always makes me think of a dragon's spines, poking up through the earth.

 

 At last we're coming down into Cwm Eigiau. Although this valley is high and remote, it's considerably more sheltered than the mountains above. The quarry can be seen on the other side.

 

 With the sun setting by around 16:20, it was night time by the time William Owen was walking down here, exhausted at the end of his journey. It's not exactly a gruelling hill to walk down, but it is hard, with all the tufts of grass and patches of moss and rushes, and the streams splitting the land.

 

 

 Closer to the quarry, the levels and spoil tips can easily be seen. Although the quarry is a small one it still dwarfs the buildings on the site.

 It's impossible to know which building William Owen would have staggered to. Perhaps the work day had ended when he arrived around 17:30. Hopefully he arrived to a warm room and hot food and drink. One set of what seems to be lodgings here still has bits of render left on the walls.

 

 

 A view from near the wheel pit over the ruins of what must have been the workshops, perhaps where the men were fitting up the machinery.

 

 

The path home at last, a long walk down the valley to the car park beyond the lake.

The Lost Cottages - Pen y Banc, Caerhun Parish

This little building sits very near to Llys y Gwynt, the gamekeeper's cottage near Hen Efail and Ty'n y Groes, but very few details can be found about it since it seems to be an industrial building rather than a residential property. The place is marked as 'Pen y Banc' on the 1888-1913 map, and sits at Ordnance Survey Grid Reference SH 7796 7286. It is built on the edge of, and accessed from, the small plot of land on the hill summit which surrounds Llys y Gwynt.

Although it's very close to Llys y Gwynt, because of its position just down off the edge of the hill the building is hardly visible from the gamekeeper's cottage. A track on this map appears to connect the two buildings directly, branching off the main track past Llys y Gwynt to reach Pen y Banc. Another track leads from between the two buildings down to the farm of Tan y Bryn. The speculated history of Tan y Bryn and its possible connection with Llys y Gwynt is detailed in my post about the gamekeeper's cottage.

On one side of the hill is the Afon Conwy, and the important ferry crossing of Tal y Cafn, while on the other side runs the main road to Conwy.

There is a single possible sign of habitation in the census, where Pen y Banc is mentioned just before Tan y Bryn in 1861, in the occupation of wood man John Hughes, 38, his wife Jane, 36, daughter Ellin, 2, and daughter Jane, possibly two months old. Llys y Gwynt isn't mentioned in this census, though. Is it possible this family are living there, but using the name of Pen y Banc? Or were they living in this building that appears to have no domestic features?

See a short video of the place here.

The majority of what appears to be the building is actually a high-walled yard, with a small building at the west end which is still partly roofed.

The yard is on the left, eastern side, with the building on the right in the west. On the south side there seems to be another cell that would originally have been roofed, while on the far right, at the westernmost extent of the building, are the ruined remains of what looks like a forge.

Some little distance from the building a roof ridge tile lies on the ground. It's entirely possible this could have come from either this industrial building or the nearby gamekeeper's cottage. The tile didn't seem to have a maker's mark.

Inside the yard, where the walls are at least six feet tall, with a small grate set in the bottom on the southern side. My husband has suggested the high walls might have been to keep horses in, with the grate there for drainage on washing out the yard. We think this place might have been a farrier's. 

Looking out of the yard through the ruined entrance. The scots pines by Llys y Gwynt are visible on top of the hill.

This grate in the side of the yard goes through to the little building on the southern side, meaning the yard would drain into the building. This brings into question the relation of the yard to the building, and the dates of the two features.

On the western side of the yard is the main building, which is split into two unequal cells, the larger being on the left.

The door frame survives in the left door, although the bottom has rotted away.

The doorway to the smaller cell is built with some very impressive dressed cornerstones. 

The larger room has a little window in it, looking onto the yard. I couldn't see a sign of a frame here, but there may have been one once. 

The bottom of the door frame for the left hand room, with iron hinge, and the bottom lost through rotting.

Inside the bigger room, looking into the yard, with the top hinge in the door frame.

This room is still mostly roofed and retains a lot of the plaster on the walls where not exposed to the weather.

The little window from inside, with a rather nice windowsill, and no sign of a window frame.

At least two walls of the room, the northern wall which divides it from the smaller room, and the western wall dividing it from the forge, have a beam built in, at about three feet from the ground level.

The beam in the northern wall, exposed by fallen plaster, leading to a corresponding beam in the western wall.

The western wall beam leading to the southern wall, which doesn't appear to have similar beam built into it. 

A look up at the roof which seems completely intact over the eastern side, but half gone on the western.

The north end of the western part of the roof has fared a little better than the south. It's the south which tends to catch the weather. 

Even the joists are starting to rot away at this southern end.

The wall is also starting to show damage. Perhaps this ruined bit is under where the roof first started to let in water.

Just to the left of the doorway was this shape in the earth. Perhaps it's just a random shape, but it seemed worth photographing.

A roof ridge tile lies on the fallen slates, very much like the one found outside.

The beam over this door is still relatively sound.

The doorway to the right hand, northern room seems much more perilous, the beam bowing under the pressure of the stones above.

Inside this narrow room, not much more than four feet wide, the same built in beam runs along the back, western, wall.

The roof here is partly intact and partly held together by ivy.

For this room the west facing roof plane has survived better than the east.

A couple of bits of wood are built into the northern wall.

A closer look at these two pieces of wood, which look as if they may have had nails driven into their centres. 

At roughly the same height as the wood, a little along the wall, the plaster shows damage. At first I thought it was another block of wood but I think it's just damage coincidentally at the same height.

A look at the bowing beam over the door from the inside.

The layers of what is possibly lime whitewash can be seen clearly on the wall in this room.

The roof over the western side is almost entirely gone.

Standing on the east side of the building, one can see the high walled yard and the little adjoining building just to the left.

 

It's hard to tell because of the ivy, but this may have had a sloping lean-to roof. 

Inside, this area is pretty much featureless, but the 1888-1913 map does suggest it was roofed at that time.

 

Looking along the south wall of the yard, which makes the north wall of this building.

A view of the grate in the yard from the other side. It's about a foot from the ground on this side.

The end wall seems to show a lean-to style slope, through the ivy.

To the left of the doorway into this little building, a piece of bent iron is embedded in the wall.

A look at that piece of iron from below.

What appears to be a broken quarry tile on the ground, possibly evidence of flooring in the building.

Another piece of bent metal about 18" long lies on the ground by the doorway.

From the south, this is the end wall of the western building, with the lower wall of the possible forge to the left. The southern building extension is to the right. The large stones have probably been cleared more recently from the ploughed field which leads down from the building. 

The corner where the main building meets the southern building. 

The wall to the left is of the possible forge. Directly on other side is where the fire would have been. Conversely, there's no sign of a fireplace in any of the other cells. This section of wall looks slightly different, as if it were built and rendered at a different time.

A little to the east of the high walled yard is what appears to be a well, covered in old gates.

I don't know the depth of the water, but someone obviously considers it deep enough to warrant a cover.

Round at the west end of the building, this is the site of the possible forge. Note the letterbox sized slot in the wall. Perhaps coincidentally, there's a change in the stones in the wall at about this point, from larger ones to smaller.

 

This slot doesn't go through the wall all the way, and there was no sign of it on the inside.

A lot of roof slates litter the ground here, where the floor to the possible forge may have been, probably from the roof of the main building. There are signs on the ground, level with the slot in the wall, that this was the doorway into this area, with the wall, very ruined, visible to the right. This makes this area shorter from north wall to south than the main building.

Only a very low wall remains on the west side of this cell, partly covered by tree branches. It seems likely this forge area was unroofed, or barely roofed.

At the end of the cell is what looks like the site of a fireplace. It seems to have two parts, divided by a shallow wall. It looks as though the right side had a roof, sloping upwards from the right, while the left side held the chimney. There's a flue hole leading from the right side, through the wall in the centre.

This right side is actually curved in shape at the back, the line straightening when it meets the side walls.

On the left is what seems to be the plastered remains of the chimney flue.

Looking through from the right to the left, this is the flue that connects the right side to the chimney.

Looking into the right side of the fireplace from the furthest right extent. The whole is mortared but no longer shows signs of soot.

The dividing wall between the two segments has bricks on the left side.

The apparent roof-line above the right side of the fireplace.

 

Looking along the floor of this apparent forge area, with the wide doorway in the foreground of the photo.

 

 

From the western side the apparent forge almost disappears against the more intact building beyond. Hopefully someone reading this may have a better idea of what this building was used for than me. I can construct a plausible case for it being a farrier associated with the large house, Tan y Bryn, just down the hill. That house at some point has become quite a large place, with considerable outbuildings, and possibly quite a few horses. The track leads straight up from Tan y Bryn to this building and to Llys y Gwynt, the gamekeeper's cottage. It doesn't seem unreasonable that the place might have had a farrier, or that the employer responsible for the gamekeeper had a farrier on the hill. Tan y Bryn is just over the road from Hen Efail - the 'Old Smithy.' The smith could have moved up the hill to here, or it could be a completely unrelated venture. Either way, shoeing horses would have been noisy and smelly, so having a farrier building well away from the posher buildings doesn't seem unreasonable. The gamekeeper's reaction to such a building so close to his home probably didn't factor in the decision.

 

This conjecture may be completely wrong. I would love to hear from someone who knows more about either this building or whether it's likely to be a farrier's.