The Lost Cottages - Cae'r Llin, Llanbedr y Cennin Parish

Cae’r Llin is a very ruined and overgrown little cottage high up on the edge of the Afon Dulyn, the river which flows down from Dulyn to the Afon Conwy in the valley below. On a calm day all that can be heard is the calling of birds and the hiss of the river fifty metres below. The house sits at 200 metres above sea level, surrounded by brambles and bracken and not on the public footpath. The house shows habitation from at least 1700, but occupation dies out after the 1861 census, and the place doesn’t seem to have retained any used trackways or paths as many of these places do. The name is mentioned in an estate sale of 1920, but likely simply as a piece of land.

The house would have had a few relatively close neighbours when it was inhabited; Pennant further down the river, as well as Cae Ithel Ucha and Cae Ithel Isa, Onen Ebryd on the hill above, and Llwyn Onn further up the river.

This post is made up of photographs from October 2020, and from May 2021.

See a video of the house here.

 

Approaching from the river below makes for a very steep climb up a slope which is carpeted in clawing brambles and tangled bracken, although the place sits relatively near to open farmland at the top of the slope. It seems to consist of a single detached outbuilding, with a long east facing cottage to the south with one outbuilding on the end.

 

 The gable end of the attached northern outbuilding seems relatively intact.

 

 

The stonework is still quite tight, and doesn't show obvious working to face the stones. It's hard to tell if the ridge was always at this height, or if the wall might have collapsed a little at the top.

There are good large cornerstones on this north-eastern corner of the little outbuilding, which is only a few yards across.

There was probably a door into the outbuilding in the centre of the photograph.

 

Just to the north of the house is the detached outbuilding, with only one wall still standing on the west side.

 

 

 

A long, slim stone stands about five feet from the wall, which looks as if it may have formed a low partition in the building. I've seen similar arrangements dividing one pigsty from another, so it's possible that this building was a pigsty. If there were walls on the other sides of the building they seem to have almost entirely disappeared. There are some slates leaning up against this large upright stone, so perhaps this little outbuilding had a slate roof at one time.

 The only remaining part of the south wall of this detached outbuilding is made from one very large stone.

 

 

Between the detached outbuilding and the house, on the east side, is what seems to be a single tall gatepost.

 

 A number of quite thick slates are lying on the ground, up on edge as if this is where they fell from the collapsing roof. Such coarse, thick slates point to this being a fairly early roof in the history of using slate.

 

 

The slate is very roughly split, and many of the slabs are about half an inch thick.

 

 A large tree has grown up on the back wall of the outbuilding attached to the house, which has probably displaced a lot of the stones.

 

 

A view of the gable end of this attached outbuilding from the inside.

The corner of the main house looks rather rougher than the outbuilding, and this gable end is certainly more ruined. It looks as if it were built separately from, so probably earlier than, the outbuilding.

The first evidence of occupation I have found is a baptism in the Llanbedr y Cennin parish records, when Anne, daughter of John ab Ewan and Grace ach Robert Parry was baptised in September 1700. Grace must have died at some point in the next few years, because the next entry is in 1707, when John ab Ewan's wife is called Gwenna Owen, and their son Owen is baptised on the 6th of April. They go on to have Elizabeth baptised on the 6th of January 1709, and Margaret on the 6th of April, 1715.

The next entry I have found is a burial in 1747, when Ellis Thomas of Cae'r Llin, widower, was buried on March the 15th.

There is a baptism for Anne, the daughter of Richard Roberts of Cae llin by his wife Jane on April 3rd, 1778, but Anne was buried on the 20th of the same month. Another burial occurs, perhaps with another new family in the house, in 1813, when labourer Hugh Hughes, 22, is buried on September 11th. It's unknown if Hugh Hughes was related to the next occupants, but at least from 1819 until the house's last appearance in the census in 1861, the place is lived in by Thomas Hughes, a farmer, and wife Margaret Hughes.

 

Baptisms seem limited to the church in Llanbedr y Cennin - perhaps the sensible choice for a fragile infant, because it's much closer than Caerhun church. There are a number of burials in Caerhun, though. In 1817 Ellin Hughes was buried at Caerhun, aged 15 months. I can't find a baptism record for her in Caerhun or Llanbedr. It is possible that she was the child of Thomas and Margaret Hughes. I can't find a marriage reference for the couple after 1813, either, and a period of a few decades before that is missing from the marriage records.

In 1819 Thomas and Margaret have another child Ellin, born on March 17th and baptised on the 21st. In 1821 their daughter Margaret is born, followed by Jane in 1824, and son John in 1827. Jane dies in 1832 at the age of seven, and is buried in Caerhun. Thomas Hughes of Caellin is buried in Caerhun at the age of 8, in 1849, but I can't find a baptism record for him. Catherine Hughes of Caer llin is buried in 1851 in Caerhun, aged 21, but I can't find a baptism record for her, either. She is mentioned in the census, though.

 

Curiously, although the census shows Thomas and Margaret continuing to live in Cae'r Llin up until 1861, in November 1835 Ellin, daughter of John Hughes, a farmer, and Anne Hughes is baptised. Perhaps there were more members of the Hughes family living in this small house.

 

 The inside of the cottage itself is full of undergrowth and trees, making it very hard to make out details.

The censuses for the cottage only show occupation until 1861, and through that time the house is lived in by the Hughes family. In 1841 Thomas Hughes is a farmer of 50, married to Margaret who is also 50, and living with children Margaret, 20, John, 15, and Catherine, 11. In 1851 Thomas is 58, a farmer of 35 acres - this differs from the 1846 tithe and the later census which show he has 50 acres. His wife Margaret is 62, son John 24, and Catherine 21; Catherine will die only a few months later. In 1861 the family no longer have children at home. Thomas is 69, a farmer of 50 acres, and Margaret is 73. They are living with a servant, Jane Jones, 13, and also have a visitor, 10 year old Margaret Jones who was born in Llangwstennin. The only record I can find subsequent to this is when Margaret Hughes dies at the age of 83 in May 1866, and is buried in Caerhun. This is quite an age difference to her age of 73 in the 1861 census.

It's unknown where the missing family members were baptised or buried. Perhaps they were occasional chapel goers, or sometimes used another church further afield.

 

 

The cottage disappears into the growth and it's impossible, without cutting back a huge amount of vegetation, to see the extent of the place.

 

 A wide angle shot inside the house, facing north, shows the ruin of the fireplace in the wall dividing the house from the northern outbuilding. It is relatively easy to make out the two thick walls to either side of the fireplace, with the slew of collapsed stone in the middle. It seems likely the fireplace had a wooden beam rather than a stone lintel, given this amount of collapse.

 

 

 

 The eastern end of the fireplace, with its thick wall.

 

 

 

 The western end of the fireplace is of a similar width, and has violets growing on the top. It's impossible to tell if the place ever had a bread oven, but given the early date that it went out of use, it's possible that it never did.

 

 

 

 There is a lot of rubble in the centre, which is typical of the sudden collapse of an entire chimney when the beam finally rots.

 

 

The western wall of the house has survived to about three feet high.

 

 The slope up to the house, an absolute tangle of bracken and bramble. It's hard to imagine quite how it would have looked in the past, or where any paths might have gone. There are a couple of tracks marked on the 1888-1913 Ordnance Survey map, though.

 

The 1888-1913 map, showing Cae'r Llin to the right, and Onen Ebryd to the top left. The Afon Dulyn flows through the valley below. Cae'r Llin is right on the edge of the treeline, with a few small enclosures to the north-west, and tracks leading north and then east towards Pennant further down the river, and north and then west to Onen Ebryd. The map shows a small enclosed space in front of the house, which is quite common in these cottages.

 

 The land just to the west of the house is a rather beautiful, spreading pasture, and is part of the field farmed by the occupant of Cae'r Llin in the 1846 tithe map.

 

 

 A little to the north west of the house is a number of small enclosures, on the land included in the tithe entry for the house, which were probably used by the farmer. In 1846 Thomas Hughes was farming two large parcels of land of a total of just over 50 acres, one centring on the house, and one up on the eastern slopes of Pen y Gaer.

 

 

 

 It's hard to make out exactly what the configuration of these pens might have been, but it seems likely they would have been used for sheep.

 

 

 

 This broad, spreading land is rather a surprise after fighting through the undergrowth from the river. Since the land is described in the tithe as arable, woods, and pasture, it seems likely the family were growing some crops up here as well as grazing livestock. Oats may have been grown, but the name 'Cae'r Llin' means 'Field of the flax,' and is mentioned in A Study of the Place Names of Montgomeryshire, in the journal 'Collections, historical & archaeological relating to Montgomeryshire' ('Cae'r Llin, The Field of the Flax," in Caernarvonshire'). It seems likely in that case that flax was grown here at some point.

 

 

 A little further from the pens and the house is what appears to be the remains of a walled trackway. On the 1888-1913 map a trackway is shown leading up to the farm and mill of Onen Ebryd, higher up the slope. If at one point Cae'r Llin produced flax, I wonder if it's possible that Onen Ebryd ever processed the crop. It has been mentioned that the place may have been a chaff mill, but I'm not sure what that involves.