The History of Builth Wells

Just a year later, in 1278, Edward granted a charter to the town allowing it to hold a market, establishing Builth’s 700-year legacy as a Market Town. It is believed that this market was originally held on the main road connecting the castle to the church, with part of this road still named Market Street. Although other parts of town were later also used for the market, the tradition of using this particular street for markets – and especially the sale of sheep - continued for almost 650 years, and it was not until the creation of the current livestock market at the start of the 20th century that the sale of animals along Market Street came to an end .

In 1282, just as Builth castle was nearing completion, a general rebellion broke out amongst the Welsh against the English, and Prince Llywelyn ap Gruffydd felt compelled to join his countrymen. After several battles in the North, Llewelyn lead his army south, trying to gather support as he went, arriving in the Builth area in December 1282 at the same time as the arrival of English forces under the Marcher Lord Edmund Mortimer. The exact account of events during this period vary, but somehow Llewelyn was apparently separated from his army and killed by a small English force (possibly even a single knight). At approximately the same time his army was attacked by English forces and routed at the Battle of Orewin Bridge, effectively the Second War of Welsh Independence. There is some suggestion Llywelyn may have come to Builth Castle seeking the support of the Castle Stewart, while others suggest he was lured into a trap set by Mortimer, but for whatever reason he was caught and killed near Cilmeri, ending the life of the last native Prince of Wales. His head was cut from the body and sent to Edward before being subsequently taken back to London, while his body was allegedly buried at the nearby Cistercian Abbey at Abbey Cwm Hir.

Builth castle would continue to be garrisoned until the end of the fifteenth century, but its importance waned after Llewelyn’s death, as shown by the fact that although it was damaged in 1402 with the arrival in Builth of Owain Glyndwr’s army, no repairs were made until 1409. Its final destruction came during the seventeenth age, when it was stripped for masonry to help re-build local houses.

A survey of the county of Brecknock was made in 1673 by a commission of the Archbishop of Canterbury, which recorded the population of Builth as 347 people at this time. However, in 1690 an immense fire ripped through the town, destroying possibly as many as half the buildings there at the time and causing an estimated £12,000 worth of damage, a massive sum of money at that time. Collections were made across England and Wales for ‘relief of the poor sufferers of Beallt’, but despite the considerable sum of money raised by this collection only one house, a brick building situated on the High Street, was built with money from this fund, with most of the rest of the money being mis-appropriated. It is believed that it was at this time that the last of the castle’s stone was removed, being used by local people to repair the damaged caused by the fire.

By the Eighteenth Century the central part of the town was starting to assume its modern appearance, with the wooden bridge across the Wye being replaced by a stone bridge in 1779 in roughly its current location (although the Irfon bridge was still made of wood). The area around the bridge end and along what is now the main street was a market area, while the Royal Oak coaching inn (now the Lion Hotel) provided accommodation for wealthier travellers. Despite this a visitor to the town 1781 was obviously not impressed by what he found there:

“It is a place of no great extent, consisting of two parallel streets, one close to the river, which is narrow, ill built and extremely dirty, and the other on higher ground above, which is more open and contains some good houses of modern erection. There are besides a few lanes that connect the main streets, in one of which stands The Kings Head, the principle inn, in as inconvenient a situation as could possibly have been chosen for the purpose. In the lower street which is the principle thoroughfare, as it communicates with all the great roads leading to the town, almost every house is a tavern or a shop; from which circumstance a stranger would be induced to suppose that this must be a trading place of some importance. The fact however is far otherwise. The shops are, all of them, on a small scale and ill-furnished, and with very few exceptions yield but a scanty subsistence to the proprietor.

We passed through Builth on a Market day, and our ride through the crowds in the streets was attended with difficulty. It at first amazed us to see the fullness of these weekly meetings in such little towns for they appeared more like large fairs than common markets; the houses were not sufficient for the people who thronged to them, nor were the stables capacious enough for their horses.”

 However, that was all about to change.

In the 1801 census the population of Builth was recorded as being 677, living in 107 houses, an average of nearly seven people to each house, with a further 146 people living in Llanelwedd. But as the attraction of Builth’s Spa waters became more widespread, Builth size and population start to grow. The Sulphur springs at Glanne Wells were already known about in the late eighteenth century, while legend has it that the Saline spring at Park Wells was discovered at the start of the Nineteenth century by a group of thirsty mowers. However, it was not until the Victorian era that the practice of ‘taking the waters’ at health spas such as Builth really started to boom, when it became much more the common practice amongst the middle and lower classes to vacation at such locations. The taste of the Sulphur water from Glanne was not pleasant – one person described it saying ‘It tastes strong of Sulphur and smells much like gunpowder’ - but the Saline water from Park Wells was of exceptional quality, probably one of the best Saline springs in the country. Over the next hundred years the springs would fuel a tourist boom in Builth and drive the expansion of the town, although in 1840 the town was still very much centred between the castle and the churchyard.

Builth’s popularity received a boost in 1860, when the Mid-Wales railway, a line running from Brecon to Llanidloes, finally arrived in Builth. The railway station was situated at Llanelwedd, at the area still known as station yard, becoming a major lifeline for the town for the next hundred years before its removal in 1962. Over the next few decades tourism would come to play a major part in the town’s existence, bringing significant prosperity to the town. A large number of new houses were built, especially to the West of the churchyard in Garth, Park and North roads to cater for the growing number of visitors, and a swing bridge was built to link the Park Wells to the town. It was recorded that there were seventeen alehouses in the town of Builth at this time, not including those in Llanelwedd. The first bank opened two years later and by 1868 Builth would have a full drainage and water system installed.

Originally the riverside area known as the Groe had been used by townsfolk for grazing and watering their animals. Indeed, at this time the area called Bank Square, off Market Street, was said to resemble a farmyard, so many animals were to be found there, with the owners taking them down to the Groe by the route then known as Duck Lane (now called Groe Street). On their way down this road they would pass another business that used the river a lot, the local tanner based in a group of cottages (now removed) named Tanner’s Row.

Now however, the growing tourist trade in the latter half of the nineteenth resulted in a number of improvements to the riverside area. In order to save people walking up to the wells a pump room for the spring water was opened on the Groe, just above the area of the swimming pool, called Jane’s Parlour, and the area was improved to provide recreation for the many visitors coming to visit. A weir was built below the bridge and boating on the Wye became very popular, as was walking along the riverside walk created there and in the Pleasure Gardens. This did not mean that people no longer used the area for animal grazing though, and well into the twentieth century sheep were grazing on the Groe.

The census figures for 1871 record the town’s population as being 1,080 and growing steadily (it would be 1,455 just ten years later). In 1875 the new church of St Mary’s, built around the much older Medieval tower, was opened, while the following year, in order to fill what was seen as lack of a cultural and civic hub for the town, it was decided the town needed a market and assembly hall. As a result, 1876 saw the construction of both the Assembly rooms (now the Wyeside Arts Centre) and the Strand Hall, with the completion of both buildings the following year.

In 1895 Thomas Lant first arrived in Builth and took over the quarry. As one of the successful contractors to supply stone to the Birmingham Water Authority for the construction of their new dams at Elan Valley, his arrival saw the scale of the quarry grow considerably, employing some 300 men at its height. Stone was cut and dressed here before being shipped to Elan Valley by rail. He would become a major benefactor to the town, donating both the top of the Groe were the Bowling green is to be found and the football field. A year later worked commenced on the main part of the Builth Wells Cottage Hospital. Situated high above the town and clear of the damp river air, it had six beds originally, with provision for six more if required.

In 1904 Builth had a very special visitor, when ‘Buffalo Bill’ Cody brought his famous Wild West show to Builth as part of his European tour. Arriving on a special train before dawn, the show’s arena ran the length of the Groe, from the Groe entrance as far up as where the swimming pool now stands. While the show involved hundreds of people and horses, a large area of tents both public and private and, of course, a grandstand and arena. Everything was set up, two shows were held, and then everything removed and put back on the train and on to the next location in a single day, so efficient was the shows organisation. So great was the popularity of this event that special trains were laid on to bring eager visitors from all over the area to Builth, while local schoolchildren were given a special day’s holiday to allow them to attend.

In 1907 fire once again ripped through Builth’s high Street, burning for three hours before being brought under control, destroying buildings along Broad Street from the Crown Hotel (now Barclay’s Bank) almost as far as the White Horse Inn, and badly damaging a number of other buildings in that area. Part of the problem had been the lack of a Fire Brigade in Builth, which The Urban District Council had disbanded ten years previously, and as a result Fire Engines had to be summoned from Llandrindod Wells, Brecon and Hay-on-Wye to fight the fire. As a result of the damaged caused, the street was widened to its present width along the worst affected area between what is now Barclay’s Bank and Boots the chemist, with the original road being no wider than the road outside Boot’s.

In 1910 Builth finally acquired a dedicated Livestock market on Brecon Road. Up until this time all animal sales had been held on the town streets, with sheep sold in pens on Market Street and Bank Square and Cattle roaming free on the High Street. These had not been popular with everyone – One headmaster wrote in 1898 that the children had been given a holiday due to ‘a Cattle Fair in town and this prevents the little children from attending on account of a large number of the horrid animals on the road at the time of opening school’.

A year later it was decided by a local councillor, Abram Davies, that the Groe walk along the riverfront would be much improved with the addition of an avenue of trees. This was a controversial idea at the time, and, although planting went ahead, this walk became christened ‘Abram’s Folly’. Despite this, the beautiful tree lined avenue this created remains one of Builth’s most attractive features.    

Like most towns in Britain, the start of World War One in 1914 brought great changes to Builth. As well as many local men joining up – more than sixty of whom would never come back – many others were sent to the area to train, and troops were regularly coming and going at the train station. The local workhouse (built in the late Nineteenth Century) was converted into a nursing hospital for soldiers wounded at the front, as was the Builth Church Hall. In 1917 in an attempt to make up for the shortage of young men available for farm work, the first Women’s Land Army units were created, including a number operating around Builth.

By the start of the 1920’s the heart of the town looked very much as it does today, with a population only slightly smaller than present, numbering 1,776 in 1921. In 1925 the Wye River bridge was widened to its present appearance, nearly doubling its previous width to allow for the greater volume of traffic now using it, while in 1936/37 the old arched masonry bridge across the river Irfon was knocked down and replaced by the much wider current one. Also in 1936, a new Post Office was built on Strand street to replace the existing one on Castle Street, giving it the distinction of being one of only two opened during the reign of King Edward VIII and bearing his crown above the door (although the building is no longer a Post Office, it still exists).

With the outbreak of war in 1939 Builth once again found its life changed. On September 5th of that year the first evacuees arrived in Builth, and though most returned home during the next few months, the pattern had been set. In 1941 171 more evacuees came to Builth from the Merseyside area, and Builth school was forced to run a duel system of education for a while, with Builth pupils attending school in the morning and evacuees in the afternoon. In an attempt to cope with the large numbers of children arriving Horeb vestry was pressed into service as a schoolroom. Although many of these evacuees had returned home by 1944, their departure was replaced by a further 250 children arriving from London in July of that year, evacuated in response to the V-bomb blitz the Capitol was suffering. As a result, for a period there were classes of up to 46 pupils while the Horeb vestry held up to 70 pupils. This was only short term thankfully, and by September many of the London children had been able to return home, nevertheless even then Builth still had more than 100 evacuee children, as well as many adults who had moved here to safety.

The war also intruded in more general ways. During the war the Strand hall was converted into an armaments factory, making parts for anti-aircraft guns, while a prisoner of war camp was created in the area between the Castle mound and the river, with many of these prisoners (mostly Italians) working on the farms in the area. This camp was later adapted into accommodation for some of the Land Army women sent to the area. A number of the new people brought here by these buildings chose to remain after the war, settling down here and making a life as Builth residents. And, of course, there were the soldiers.

A Home Guard unit was established early in the war at Builth, but like so many other parts of rural Britain, Builth was seen as an excellent place to establish military camps, far from the risk of German bombers. As part of this, in 1940 a major training range was created up on the Epynt mountains, invaluable to the war effort but resulting in many local farmers being disposed. A large new military camp was created on the edge of town in the area that is now Pendre, with the layout of modern Pendre mirroring the original layout of the army camp that was there before. Other troops were stationed in the area that is now the Royal Welsh Show Ground, as well as at other camps and houses in the immediate area, especially in the build up to the D-Day landings, when many Americans were billeted here. Many military vehicles were parked on the Groe during this period, while slit-trenches were dug on the Groe for the town to use as air-raid protection.

The 1950’s and 60’s saw the largest expansion of the town since the end of the Nineteenth century, with the creation of large new housing estates in Pendre, Western Grove, and Oaklands Crescent. 1951 also saw the first visit to Builth of the Royal Welsh Agricultural Show, still a travelling show at the time. It was not until 1963 that it chose Builth as a permanent home, attracting 42,000 people to its first three day show here, a figure that has grown steadily ever since, especially since 1981 when it became a four-day show. In 1956 the present stone monolith was erected as a memorial to the death of Prince Llewellyn at Cilmery, replacing the earlier one that stood there.

Builth has continued to change as it progressed into the new millennium. The town continued to grow with the development of new housing round the periphery of the town, with a number of new estates growing up on virtually every approach road into town. In 1978 the town acquired its own Art Centre, an unlikely facility in such a small town, with the conversion of the Assembly Rooms into the Wyeside Arts Centre, while the growing population required the building of both a new Primary school and a new High School by the start of the new millennium.

Across nearly a thousand years of history the nature of Builth has been a town of constant change, from medieval fortress to market town to Victorian tourist centre, a history of change that is still evident from the castle earthworks to the buildings that once housed the wells it is named for. Yet beneath all the surface change, Builth remains today what it has always been – a rural market town, sitting on an important river crossing between North and South Wales, nestled deep in the heart of beautiful Mid-Wales.