How the town started

The market town of Abergavenny in Monmouthshire nestles in the valley of the River Usk surrounded on three sides by hills which form the southern end of the Black Mountains.

Settlement in this area of South Wales dates back to Neolithic times and a long glacial mound provided an easily defended site for the first settlers about 6,000 years ago. Evidence of their - and other later - occupation can be found on display at Abergavenny Museum.

THE ROMANS
The Romans occupied a timber fort here from 50 - 150 AD. The fort, then known as Gobannium, which translates as the place of the ironsmiths, was halfway along the route between the Roman fortresses at Caerleon and Brecon. Only the position of the north gate, part of the north ditch and a length of its southern rampart are known.

THE NORMANS:
Almost a thousand years later in 1087, the Normans began their conquest of this area, and chose almost the same site for a castle from which they could control the river crossing and protect their lines of communication and supply in the Usk Valley.
The castle, built by Hamelin de Ballon, had a wooden keep on a steep hillock, a palisaded top and bottom and was surrounded by a ditch which is still visible in the castle garden below the 19th century museum and keep. From about 1190 the Normans started to rebuild the castle in stone.

Six Norman families were among those who held the castle and lordship of Abergavenny: the de Ballons, de Braoses, Canteloupes, Hastings, Beauchamps and Nevills (see also the 'Castle' page).

GROWTH OF THE TOWN:
The town grew up alongside the castle, extending along Castle Street as far as the middle of the present car park. A kink in the wall facing the river meadow marks the western end of the bank and ditch which probably defended the town on that side. Most Welsh towns - apart from later iron and coal townships - began as Norman boroughs.

These medieval towns were pockets of alien population. Even by 1300 only about seven per cent of residents were Welsh. In 1241 the town was extended and protected by strong walls. A defensive wall was built with a ditch on the north and probably the east side to enclose a much larger township. The town was a long D-shaped enclosure with four main gateways. `The wooden walls were replaced by stone in the late 1290s and early 1300s.

Streets were laid out in a regular pattern (the west end of Flannel Street has since disappeared under the modern Post Office). Each block within the grid contained burgage plots rented to burgesses - the traders and merchants of the town.

ORIGINS OF THE MARKET:
A wedge of land south of Nevill Street was left clear for a medieval market. The buildings from the present Burtons shop to the former Charles Price shop were probably an in-fill after the market moved to Cross Street. It is likely that a market started at Nevill Street because cattle and sheep were brought there, via the north and west gates, from the nearby river meadows and Grofield pastures during Welsh attacks on the town.

There are other indications that the market was sited there; Nevill Street was called Rother Street (rother means horned cattle), and there was also a Chicken Street and Butchers Row; an area of cobbling was discovered in the north corner of the Post Office excavation; three of the five inns in the area were called The Cow Inn, The Bull Inn and The Pied Inn; St. John's church stands close by and markets were often held in and around churches.

The town also suffered the ravages of the Black Death during the 1340s and was devastated by Owain Glyndwr's raid in 1404 during his fight for an independent Welsh nation. Abergavenny eventually recovered with the setting up of local industries such as tanning and weaving during the 16th and 17th centuries. The town also became known for a type of flannel woven here and which was named after it. But the name Flannel Street is relatively new. In the 19th century it was called Butchers Row.

SPA TOWN:
In the mid 18th century, Abergavenny had a brief spell of prosperity as a "spa town". The milk from local goats was considered good treatment for consumption, and their hair was made into exceptionally fine white wigs.

The town continued to expand in the 19th century with the coming of the railway and the town also prospered with links from the iron and coal industries of Gwent.

ST. JOHN'S CHURCH AND HENRY VIII SCHOOL: St John's Church by Michael Blackmore
There may have been an earlier Norman church and even a Celtic one, but no evidence of them exists here or elsewhere in the town.
St. John's was probably built in the early 1300s (the shape of the west doorway and window above are appropriate), at the north end of the new, expanded town, the walls of which were begun in 1241.

This follows the typical pattern of having the castle at one end of the town, the church at the other, and the market in a triangular area in between; though in our case the market seems to have surrounded the church in the triangle bounded by High Street, Flannel Street and Nevill Street.

The extent of the church graveyard is difficult to estimate. High Street may have originally been a footpath across the churchyard. It was certainly a street well before 1600.

Perhaps St John's was already in disrepair after Owain Glyndwr's raid of 1404 as the people had long been using St Mary's when it was given to them for a parish church after the dissolution of the monasteries. In 1542 the disused St John's became the town's grammar school, and Henry VIII gave tithes which had previously supported the priory for the upkeep of the school. St David Lewis (see the Gunter House) was a son of one of the headmasters.

The burgesses of the town were given control of the school, but when they refused to swear allegiance to William and Mary in 1689 they lost the Royal Charter and consequently the right to administer the 'royal school'. In addition, several tenants took advantage of the situation and did not pay their tithes so that in 1719 the Court of Chancery appointed a receiver to recover them.

In the meantime the running and support of the school was in the hands of Jesus College, Oxford, and for many years the headmaster was appointed from there. In 1750 the tower was rebuilt, a copy of the original one. In 1898 a new school, called King Henry VIII Grammar School was built in Pen-y-Pound and soon afterwards St John's was bought by the Freemasons for their lodge.

MARKET STREET:
At first it was a nameless alleyway - through a sallyport (a gate which the besieged used to make a sally or sortie to surprise attackers) in the town wall - to the Cibi brook where townspeople could fetch their water and do their washing. At the junction with High Street was the High Cross.

In the High Street were the bullrings and below the High Cross was the Market Hall. The old houses of Market Street with their raised pavement show what much of the town must have looked like in about 1600, the only change being the replacement of the wooden jetty posts with iron ones in the 19th century.

In the 18th century the street was called Traitors Lane, from the legend that in the 15th century Owain Glyndwr was let in through the small gate to attack the castle and devastate the town.

TOWN HALL AND MARKET:
As already mentioned, the first market place was in the wedge of land alongside Nevill Street. In 1620, a new timber-framed market house was erected in the middle of Cross Street in front of the present Market Hall (which explains the width of the street at
this point).

However, by 1794 this was causing so much congestion that the Improvement Commissioners ordered it to be demolished and a new market to be erected on the present market and Town Hall site. This market, pictured right, was designed by John Nash (not yet famous as George IV's architect) and had a classical front, a covered corn market and an open courtyard surrounded with stalls.

The old town wall at the back was raised to 14 feet to keep out the north wind although little remains of it now. Among goods sold were corn, flour, meat, fish, poultry, butter, cheese and vegetables. A sheep market was started in Castle Street in 1825 but other animals were sold in the streets until the cattle market was opened in Lion Street in 1863. The sale of animals was then banned from the streets.

By the middle of the century it was decided that a covered market was desirable, and this, with the Town Hall in front, in the style of the continental Hotel de Villes, was completed in 1870. The clock was donated by Crawshay Bailey, the ironmaster who lived at Llanfoist, and its verdigris tower is now a landmark from all the surrounding hills.

The main Tuesday produce market has extended both its range of goods and its size. Stalls sell clothes, books, cakes, sweets, flowers, plants, vegetables, toys, crockery and kitchen goods, jewellery and other accessories, shoes, textiles and a host of other goods. As other industries disappear the relative importance of the market to Abergavenny has increased. The Market Hall is also used for antique fairs, farmers' markets, craft fairs, auctions and, each September, the award-winning Abergavenny Food Festival which draws visitors from Britain and abroad.

TANNING INDUSTRY: Tan House now part of a retirement home complex
From old deeds we know that a tanning industry existed on the site of Tan House (now extended and called Pegasus Court, a retirement housing complex) at least as early as 1691. The 18th century house was once the master tanner's home. Tan pits and workshops lay in the direction of the Renault garage behind; the Tanners Arms is now Eric Davies, furnishers. The leather industry was then one of the most important industries in the town.

Tanning was only the first process, with allied trades such as boot and shoe making, saddlery and glove-making taking place nearby. On the Pinch/Fulgoni site alone 150 persons were employed at glove and shoe making.

The coming of railways in 1855 brought competition from new glove making factories in the Midlands. Rate returns tell us that work ended on the site between 1884 and 1889.

Mill Street was once the only entry to the town from the south (the road from Abergavenny hotel to the Swan was constructed about 1930). The mill, which stood on the south side of the street, was powered by waters of the mill race which ran under Tan house, and also by the Cibi brook which joins it just behind the house.