Many of the gentry houses of Britain failed to survive the 20th century. Even the old mansions of Wales, often very different buildings to those attached to the large estates of England, proved in many cases to be just too impractical or expensive to maintain.
Brymbo’s own large house, the former home of the Griffith family and the centre of the small but historically significant estate later purchased by the ironmaster John Wilkinson, was no exception to this. The remarkable picture above shows its sad end, though this was only after a long period of decline and dereliction.
By the end of the 19th century the Hall was one of the more unusual assets of the Brymbo steel company, the successor to Wilkinson’s business empire. Although much of the old estate was given over to industry, the demesne land of the Hall – “Brymbo Park” as locals called it – and its sheltering wood were still, more or less, intact.
In this era the house itself was occupied by Peter Williams, the talented steelworks employee who had risen to the position of General Manager (and finally to Managing Director). It was Williams who, under John Henry Darby, had employed the open-hearth steelmaking process in 1883-84, a first in Britain. However, the antiquated house fell out of use in the first part of the 20th century and by the 1920s it was empty, save for the occasional presence of a caretaker.
During the 20s it was suggested that the Hall was turned into a village institute for Brymbo. The idea was seriously explored and some plans were drawn up, but sadly it all came to nothing: if it had succeeded, this would surely have been the most spectacular and architecturally significant village institute in the country. Instead, the building became increasingly derelict, and began to gain a sinister reputation locally, as large abandoned buildings often do.
The Hall was briefly used in the Second World War. By the 1940s the land behind it was opencast: after all those centuries of being preserved from the intense mining activity that went on around it, the house and its surrounding land sat on a huge pillar of coal. Finally the occupant of the estate’s old home farm decided to put the house to some use, and chickens and pigs lived in the rooms that John Wilkinson had once known. The eastern wing lost its old roof, and many of the windows were bricked up, while the terraced gardens dwindled to grass and weeds.
However, it was the coal that had once made the estate so valuable that was to prove the old house’s final undoing. It just outlasted the township’s other main building, Plas Mostyn, also dating from the early 17th century. It is stated in many books that the Hall was demolished in 1973, shortly before the “Ty Cerrig Extension”, as the second phase of the large opencast works immediately south of Brymbo village was formally known, was opened up. However, the first set of opencast workings, covering some 81 acres north of the road to Penrhos, was commenced in 1971, and the date of the picture at the beginning of this article seems to suggest that demolition of the Hall may have started, at least, in 1970.
With it went a huge chunk of the area’s history – not just the house itself, with its memories of Wilkinson and its many earlier owners, but no doubt all kinds of archaeological evidence of a site used for hundreds of years. By the mid 1970s, as the picture at right shows, a huge pit occupied the site of the Hall and the Park. A survey by the Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust, conducted around 1978, found nothing left.
11 comments
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March 8, 2013 at 1:54 am
royston williams
just before brymbo hall was demolished it was filmed prob on 8mm i was there i was 8/9 at the time please let me know if it was saved and if 2 boys are on it me and my bro andy
March 8, 2013 at 2:12 pm
thefireonthehill
Hi, I’ve never seen this film or heard of it before now. However if it did still exist it would be a very important record – there are surprisingly few pictures of the Hall in existence.
I assume the film is in private hands if it exists, do you remember who was filming?
March 15, 2013 at 12:52 am
JaynebWilson
Peter Williams who lived here was my second great grand uncle – I really wish the hall never met this fate. It would have been fascinating to have seen inside it !
July 26, 2014 at 8:33 pm
Peter Lloyd
Peter Williams was my great grand farther and his son CP Williams was brother to my farther’s mother.
February 24, 2015 at 3:38 am
Jayne Wilson
Dear Peter, I’m hoping that your fathers mother is called Mina. I’ve been having trouble finding her BMD records to help complete missing bits of my tree. Do you have any more information?
Interestingly Peter Williams conducted sometimes Brymbo & Broughton musical society & CP Williams played the piano/ organ. I have copies of newspaper articles from the late 1890’s.Arthur Williams played the piano/organ too as his piano exam was published in a local newspaper.
A big concert conducted by Peter was Handels Messiah.
May 12, 2013 at 5:17 pm
Harry Parker
Hello, I very much enjoy your articles, I am a local and have always had an interest in industry, past and present. I was 14 in 1973- 74 and had always played with mates at the ruin of the old hall, I remember the people that lived in the house next to it ( Not by name though) they often told us to ” bugger off” anyhow I remember the what remained of the hall being pulled down at this time and the best parts, door ways, windows / mullions, gable stone work all being laid out in the field and numbered, I used to talk to the men doing this work ( I think one of them was called Tommy Taylor ? )and I am sure one told me it was going to be crated up and sent to America as in USA ? I remember the opencast overtaking the area about 1974-5, we used to play in ” Frenches” drag line crane, it was massive and fascinated us ! I well remember the 12 apostles too.
May 14, 2013 at 4:22 pm
thefireonthehill
Hi, very interesting to hear your memories of the area and I’m glad you’ve been enjoying the site. Lots more to come in the future!
I had wondered if any stonework might have survived. Architectural salvage was too valuable even then to simply break up…I suppose the Steelworks records might contain something about it as they were the landowners. Perhaps a unique piece of Brymbo history is on a building somewhere across the Atlantic?
June 3, 2013 at 7:31 pm
Peter Lloyd
Peter Williams was my great grandfather and I have a picture of the hall with PW his wife and children sitting in the garden. He moved up to Normanby Park steelworks in Scunthorpe in 1911 and died in the flu epidemic after the First World War.
August 24, 2013 at 3:13 am
JaynebWilson
Peter Lloyd – we are related ! C.P Williams was uncle to my grandad !
Peter Williams father was John Williams – our mutual Great great great grandfather !!
Peters son was Christmas Price Williams – https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=christmas+price+williams&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en&client=safari
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=christmas+price+williams&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en&client=safari
And I have deep interest in music too – I trained as an opera singer !
I would love to see the picture you have of Peter Williams !
Jayne
October 2, 2013 at 9:51 pm
Jim Robinson
In my family history it is claimed that my Taid – Henry Robinson, painted a Horse Race meeting on the ceiling of Brymbo Hall. Can anyone confirm this?
September 19, 2021 at 11:12 pm
Chris Squire
I can’t remember a picture Jim, but i well remember the secret passages under the hall and one which ran behind the walls of some ground floor rooms.