Owainýs Own: Based on
The Life of Confederate Colonel
James M. Corns

By John H. Corns

The town of Charleston lay across the river, on the north bank of the Kanawha, to the east of the bridge site and the Elk. It was not much of a town, at least not compared with Staunton or Winchester, but Charleston was a much newer town. He had never lived here; he had no reason even to be here until the war. Now he wished he had never seen the town, wished he could turn, ride away, and forget it was there.

He pulled up the short collar of his faded, gray uniform coat to cut off the wind that blew from the receding sun. He looked down the river. She and the children were in that direction. For over the thousandth night in this war he worried if they were safe, if they were afraid. He shivered against the March cold and wished he could be with them. Wished they could all hug into one great bed under a goose-feathered comforter. He wanted to lie with her, feel her warmth, forget the losses of the fighting, and remove forever from his memory the action he was about to take tomorrow.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: May 17, 2007
• ISBN: 9780595870905

John H. Corns

John Corns is a graduate of Marshall University and a retired Army officer. He is the author of seven other books including the novels, Owain’s Own and The Bench. John and his wife, Carol, reside in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia.

Book preview

OWAIN’S OWN

BASED ON

THE LIFE OF CONFEDERATE

COLONEL

JAMES M. CORNS

A Novel

JOHN H. CORNS

iUniverse, Inc.

New York Lincoln Shanghai

Owain’s Own

Based on the Life of Confederate Colonel James M. Corns

Copyright © 2007 by John H. Corns

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording,

taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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Certain characters in this work are historical figures, and certain events portrayed did take place. However, this is a work of fiction. All of the other characters, names, and events as well as all places, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are

used fictitiously.

ISBN: 978-0-595-42760-4 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-0-595-87110-0 (cloth)

ISBN: 978-0-595-87090-5 (ebk)

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Preface

Prologue

Part One: WALES

Chapter One: Ffodus Fforc

Chapter Two: Mrs. Davies

Chapter Three: Harlech

Chapter Four: The Gift

Chapter Five: Mr. Pruel

Chapter Six: The Professor

Chapter Seven: Cartwool

Chapter Eight: The Burning

Chapter Nine: Winners Lose

Chapter Ten: Leaving

Part Two: PENNSYLVANIA

Chapter Eleven: Isaiah

Chapter Twelve: Mary

Chapter Thirteen: Mexico

Chapter Fourteen: A Christmas Visit

Chapter Fifteen: Uncle James

Chapter Sixteen: The Parting

Chapter Seventeen: Flora

Chapter Eighteen: Hannah

Chapter Nineteen: Going South

Part Three: VIRGINIA

Chapter Twenty: The Land

Chapter Twenty-One: Volunteers

Chapter Twenty-Two: Bullets And Steel

Chapter Twenty-Three: Fleeting Victories

Chapter Twenty-Four: Distant Battles

Chapter Twenty-Five: Changing Horses

Chapter Twenty-Six: Long Furlough

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Thomas Jackson Jefferson

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Al And Albert

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Loyalty And Denial

Chapter Thirty: Blade Worden

Chapter Thirty-One: Decisions

Chapter Thirty-Two: Holidaysburg

Part Four: TEXAS

Chapter Thirty-Three: Laura

Chapter Thirty-Four: Exposition

Chapter Thirty-Five: His Own

Epilogue: Louisiana

Historical Characters

Characters Created By The Author

About The Author

For Carol

Image359.JPG

James M. Corns

about 1860

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

In 1982 my younger sister, Susan, showed me an article from the Charleston Gazette newspaper, written by Boyd Stutler, about the role of a Captain James Corns in a local battle of the American Civil War. The family wondered, having the same surname, if we were related. Nearly twenty years later, retired from the military, I sought the answer to that question. Among all the sources I reviewed, the letter that is the Preface to this book best answered the question. My great, great grandfather wrote that James M. Corns was the cousin of my great grandfather, all of whom bore the name of James. Thus the motive to learn and write about James M. Corns, Colonel of Cavalry in the Civil War. Despite the informative account of James M. Corns’ military role in the Civil War, as presented by the author Jack L. Dickinson in his 8th Virginia Cavalry history, I found little about his childhood and early life and only the barest of facts about his married and business life. Determined to preserve what little of his story I had found, and moved by much I had learned about his native Wales and the turmoil of life in Civil War America, I wrote his story as historical fiction, fictionalizing the limited information available in official records. The result is a fictional expansion on those findings and the interweaving of plausible accounts of the people he knew and the places and times in which he lived.

James M. Corns was, in fact, an immigrant from Wales, served in the Mexican War, and on January 16, 1850, married Mary Ellen Glasgow in Holidaysburg, Pennsylvania. Their children, by name and time of birth, are as depicted in the story. He moved his family to Virginia in 1859, living near his Uncle James and Aunt Jane and their son, James. Following the breakup of his marriage at the end of the Civil War, he moved to Texas, married Laura Holland, and developed a prosperous business as an architect and builder. Of his and Laura’s children, two daughters died early and their son was both physically and mentally impaired.

They moved to Louisiana in 1890 and he died as depicted in the Epilogue, as did Laura and Mary in the years indicated.

The story of his life in Wales and early life in Pennsylvania is based on limited documentation. Further, much liberty has been taken in the explanation and emotional context of the available historical accounts of his years at war, in both Mexico and in the Civil War. His contacts with historical figures such as Albert Gallatin Jenkins, George Patton, and John McCausland were, while dramatized, as depicted in the story. Expressions by those figures reflect their views as revealed in recorded history.

Information was drawn from Official Records of the United States War Department; Archives of the Confederate States of America; United States census reports; newspapers, parish and court records of Wales and America; secondary source histories depicting the role of the 8th Virginia Cavalry in the American Civil War, and traditional anecdotes passed down by descendants of principle historical characters in the story.

The fictional character, Blade Worden, is based on no specific historical figure.

The story of Jamie’s childhood and passage to adulthood in Wales, as well as the character, Gareth Pryse, are creations of the author. The Characters named on the pages following these acknowledgments either are created for this story or are fictionalized historical figures as indicated.

The author is indebted to several historians of the western Virginia Civil War experience for their excellent research, and trusts that they will not be offended by the injection of fictional clutter into a Civil War record they have told with documented scholarship. The author attributes none of his flaws or unintended historical discrepancies to them, but names them for the reader who wishes to learn more about the turmoil of the people in the western counties of Virginia, which, in part, became the state of West Virginia during the war. The works of these authors are recommended: Jack Dickinson, Terry Lowry, Stan Cohen, Richard Andre, Bill Wintz, David L. Phillips, Tim McKinney, and the late Michael J. Pauley. What I learned from their selected writings far surpasses the value of this story.

The author is also indebted to the writings on Wales and Owain Glyn Dwr by R. R. Davies, John Davies, Gwynfor Evans, and Jan Morris. For the Philadelphia of the 1840s and 50s to Philip Stevick, Christopher Morley, and Robert F. Looney. To Sr. Anne Francis Pulling and Philip J. Hoffman, P.E., for the background on Holidaysburg and the Allegheny Portage Railroad.

For their shared research, the author thanks Judy West, Phil Gottshall, and Diana Heath. The content of this story in no way implies their endorsement or agreement on what is portrayed in this fictionalized account. The author further thanks for their support and expertise Bill Miller, Shirley Rothgeb, Rosalea Riley, Harold Carwell, Kitty Armstrong, Mike, Becky, and Susan Corns, Lisa Abt, and all family and relatives who for years tolerated his preoccupation with the story of James M. Corns.

I thank Carol, my best friend, closest adviser, traveling companion, and wife of over forty-eight years without whom there would be no heart in this story.

PREFACE

The Pontypool Free Press            July 4, 1863

Pontypool, Wales

THE WAR IN AMERICA—Interesting Letter from a Pontypool Emigrant— The following is an extract from a letter just received from Jas. Corns, formerly a well-known resident in this neighbourhood. It is dated Wayne County, Virginia, May 25, 1863.

It is above two years since I wrote to you last, and during this long interval we have been almost daily subject to fears and disaster from this terrible war. We are in a very bad position here, being on the borders between Virginia and Ohio. The northern army claim this part as within their lines, and are most part of the time in possession; but a southern force comes down every two or three months, when the Yankees ‘skedaddle’ across the Ohio, and return when the enemy has withdrawn. We have had a few battles fought near here, but the number engaged was but some few hundreds. The northern soldiers often come to our house, and sometimes search for arms. My son James has been a soldier in the southern army since the commencement of the war. He is in Corns’s regiment, the 8th Virginia Cavalry, noted for its bravery and dashing exploits during the war in Western Virginia. My son came home to see us last March. He came a few days before his regiment came down, and some of my neighbours went out to Pierpont camp to let the Yankees know he was here, and they sent a party of soldiers to take him. They surrounded the house before we perceived them. I opened the door, and turned back to let James know they were there, when I came near being shot for so doing. I received a note from him last week: he was then a prisoner in Cincinnati. I expect he will soon be exchanged. He would have been raised to the rank of Lieutenant in a few days if he had not been taken prisoner. His cousin, J. M. Corns, has been colonel of the 8th Virginian Cavalry for the last year, and I am informed he has gone to Richmond with his regiment, and that he will come back a Brigadier General. I went to his quarters to see him when he was down here the early part of last month. I spent part of the days and a night with him. He told me he was in better health and spirits than he had been for many years. His wife and family are back in Virginia, about 200 miles from here. My wife and myself are at present in tolerably good health, and we were getting along pretty well until last month, when, a few days after the southern men left, the Yankee soldiers came and took away my horse and saddle. It was the only horse I had, so I am in great difficulty about getting on with my work. I had one horse stolen before. I have managed to put in a small crop of corn, so I think we shall be able to go on for the next winter without much difficulty if left alone by the thievish Yankees. There are but few horses left for farming purposes in this part of the country, for the Yankees take them from the Secessionists, and the southern men take them from the union party. Surely, if the war continues much longer, it will be a very difficult matter to live in this country. Four of my brother William’s sons listed in the northern army soon after the commencement of the war, and his son Joseph was killed when out with a scouting party.

* * * *

This letter, written by the great-great grandfather of the author of Owain’s Own, refers to James M. Corns, commander of the 8th Virginia Cavalry Regiment, Army of the Confederate States of America. The story told here is historical fiction, based on limited records of the life of Colonel Corns, the fullest official record being that of his service in the American Civil War. The context of James’ life in Wales in the 1830s and 40s, the economic, military, and social forces of Pennsylvania in the 1840s and 50s, and the flow of the Civil War in western Virginia reflect the author’s intent to depict these in a manner consistent with recorded history. James M. Corns’ life is recreated as wholly fiction against those historic backdrops. It is a story of values and loyalties in conflict, as they were for so many in mid-nineteenth century America.

Churchville, Virginia     John Corns

January 2007

PROLOGUE

Charleston

March 9, 1865

The branch of green mountain laurel bent aside under the weight of his arm as he looked down at the quiet river valley. The late sun struggled behind the low clouds, allowing a few more minutes before its fading light would slip behind the hills. He had delayed his ride on the steady roan mare until late in the day. The approaching darkness lessened the danger of someone seeing him on the hillside, but there was still enough light to see the town across the river.

The view was a familiar one. The Elk River flowed toward him down the narrow valley from the north. The waters slid past the stone pillars, which once supported the cables of a long suspension bridge before crowding into the slow current of the Great Kanawha River. The Kanawha pushed slowly from the right along his front, continuing to the west some eighteen miles before it began a wide turn to the northwest on its journey to the Ohio River at Point Pleasant, West Virginia.

The Elk looked like creamed coffee as it joined the clearer, green Kanawha. Farther downstream, he knew, the rivers’ colors became one. Here at their juncture he had seen the rivers, swollen by heavy rain, clash in swirling battle in their struggle to dominate the mainstream. The more powerful Kanawha always won. Both rivers had cascaded many miles to this point. The Elk flowed out of the center of old Virginia, near the disputed border between Virginia and the new state, West Virginia. The Kanawha splashed down from the hills of North Carolina as New River and flowed north, seemingly fighting its way uphill and crashing through the mighty Appalachian Mountains before it joined Gauley River, thirty-five miles to the east of where he now stood. The Kanawha began there at the tiny town of Gauley Bridge, a merging of the New and the Gauley Rivers.

Over the last four years, his horse had carried him along the banks of these rivers, a sword of war at his side. The awful war had brought him to this place. The lonely, stone bridge pillars on the Elk said it was all true; it had all happened. A few blackened timbers still lay downstream from the bridge site on the east bank of the Elk. They had cut the cables and dropped the bridge into the river in October of 1862 as his and other withdrawing Southern troops gave up the town and the nearby salt works along the Kanawha River.

The town of Charleston lay across the river, on the north bank of the Kanawha, to the east of the bridge site and the Elk. It was not much of a town, at least not compared with Staunton or Winchester, but Charleston was a much newer town. He had never lived here; he had no reason even to be here until the war. Now he wished he had never seen the town, wished he could turn, ride away, and forget it was there.

He pulled up the short collar of his faded, gray uniform coat to cut off the wind that blew from the receding sun. He looked down the river. She and the children were in that direction. For over the thousandth night in this war he worried if they were safe, if they were afraid. He shivered against the March cold and wished he could be with them. Wished they could all hug into one great bed under a goose-feathered comforter. He wanted to lie with her, feel her warmth, forget the losses of the fighting, and remove forever from his memory the action he was about to take tomorrow.

He had been half standing, half leaning against a large rock outcropping surrounded by dark green laurel. The gray, lichen-covered rock seemed to tip precariously toward the river, but he knew the heavy, black soil anchored it firmly. The rock was nestled in one of the hillside’s few stands of leafless oak trees. The gray bark of the broad, spreading trees was a shade duller in color than the long-tailed squirrels that scurried along the limbs. He looked again at the valley, as if through a widow’s dark veil, the dull green laurel the only color showing anywhere above the shadowy green waters of the Kanawha. The fine rain that had stung his face on his ride had stopped and now rose from the surface of the river as misty fog. Smoke from the town’s chimneys rose a short distance above rooftops before bending like weather vanes to the east. He could make out the area between Front Street that ran along the Kanawha River and Back Street where a large inn and a bank building had stood before the fires of 1862. He removed a glove to rub warmth back to the tip of his nose and his cheeks, his cold jaws telling him he should not have shaved earlier in the day, although the remaining, bushy mustache and chin whiskers offered little warmth or comfort.

He turned to walk up the hill, the branch of laurel springing back to nudge his arm. The damp ground smelled of musty leaves, their fall color long since bleached by the acids of winter. The laurel thicket exceeded his near six feet height. He made his way slowly through the thicket and around the edge of the large rock. His deliberate and snail-like steps were like those of a man with a heavy load on his back.

His horse was standing behind the rock, uphill from the river. He had wrapped the reins loosely around the black trunk of a dogwood tree that slanted as if to escape the clutches of the dark crack in the rock. The horse turned her head as the man approached, her eyes showing maybe recognition, little more. The man wished he had something for the mare to eat, and he chided himself for not bringing a small bag of oats. He felt a little hungry himself, could do with a cup of hot coffee, but he could not chance a fire. Most of the Yankee Cavalry was on his side of the Kanawha, camped nearby, across a hollow and upriver from his location. Did not want them to see him—not yet

Over 200 Confederate Cavalrymen waited in these mountains, waited for his signal and directions. He was aware that some of his soldiers were uncertain about the coming action. Many were like him, from Wayne County. This was Kanawha County where the Union Cavalry guarded its county seat of Charleston. Most of the people here now supported the Union, but not all. Some had not given up, but all surely hoped for an end to this war. After the action tomorrow, that end might be closer.

He removed the saddle and bedroll from the roan’s sleek back, sliding off the hard weave, wool blanket at the same time. He ran his hand over her warm withers and back, and with a rag from his bedroll, began to rub down the red coat with its flecks of white hairs. Despite the limited grooming, she looked nearly as smooth as the first time he had seen her, one of a dozen or so fine horses that some Yankees let get away in a fight. His men rounded them up and asked him to choose the best of the bunch. He did not hesitate, rode over, took her reins, and led her away. She had been his since that day. He picked up the saddle and leaned it against the bottom of the rock face, pulling a short coil of rope from a leather thong attached to the back of the saddle. He had scratched his initials, J. C., in the dark leather of the saddle. He tied a halter with one end of the lead rope and placed it on the roan over her bridle. He attached the other end with a slipknot to a thin oak a little farther uphill in an opening in the laurel. He decided he had not needed any coffee after all, and the horse had eaten hay and mash well before he had started his ride. She would have to wait until tomorrow for more food and water. He would not be riding her far.

He unrolled his blanket and separated a large, waxed piece of tent that he spread as a ground cloth at the base of the rock. He sat, pulling the faded blue blanket over his legs and leaned back against the saddle. He pulled the gray forage cap from his head, spilling heavy, dark hair over his brow. He held the damp, cloth cap by its leather bill and slid a hand up and back over his forehead, the only combing the unruly hair had known in days. The deep indented ring of the cap lingered in his hair even after the combing gesture. Up close, he did not look as old as his movements hinted. There were wrinkles, as much from sun and wind as age. The brown eyes hid troubled thoughts. He ran a finger around inside the worn band of the cap. It had been blue when he first wore it so many years before. He reckoned that it had lost most of its color since the Scary Creek battle. It was the cap of a soldier, unlike the slouch hat his father always wore. He wondered what his father would have said about his mind-set this evening.

It was a sound military decision. Considering the conditions now in western Virginia, and for the last six months, it was the action to take. Yet there was so much more that kept stealing his thoughts and clouding his mental picture. They were deep things … and they were old. At times, they could be strong, like when he was tired, and wanted to sleep, but could not.

Part One

WALES

Image366.JPG

CHAPTER ONE:

FFODUS FFORC

Ffodus Fforc was his first place—a fork in the road in the lush, upper Teifi River Valley of western Wales. So far away now—that boyhood place—so warm and comfortable and safe. It was not always warm and not always safe, yet early, in the beginning, it was, a place for a boy to grow and to learn. The river, the mountains, the stone houses, the people—all fluttered through his mind. Then the images slowed, and he was below the bridge that crossed the river near his house. His hands groped along the smooth, slippery rocks below the surface of the river and he felt for the trout, the small, silver fish that streaked from its hiding place when hands came near. At times he caught one; sometimes more, and his family—him, his mother and father—enjoyed a fish dinner. In his memory, he was fishing alone; that was not right. He seldom fished alone. He fished with his best friend and next-door neighbor, Gareth Pryse, who lived in a house like Jamie’s, made of round river rock and roofed with the gray slate taken from the mines to the north. The Pryse house stood near the bottom of the sloping hill on the west side of the river valley, and from the front stoop you could look down the cart path that crossed the river on the Ffodus Fforc Bridge and ran through the green field to the valley road. Jamie’s house, the Corns house, stood fifty yards farther up the path and the hill from the Pryse house. From the front he could look down on the roof of the Gwynne home, a larger building, with two chimneys, not a single chimney as in Jamie’s and Gareth’s houses. The Gwynnes had built the small schoolhouse beside the river near the bridge, and Mr. Gwynne had given the land for the chapel that rose beside the cart path about halfway between the river and the valley road. The hill that rose behind Jamie’s house was over two hundred feet high, a short rise compared to the Cambrian Mountains that rose in the east of their County Cardiganshire.

A few other families lived on or near the road that ran north and south along the river valley, and most of them attended the local chapel. Only a few of the children came to the little schoolhouse with Jamie, Gareth, and the Gwynne girls. Few children received schooling at all, except that taught in the chapel. Most local people had learned to read the little they could in the chapel. Many families in the valley rented small acreages on which they raised a few sheep; still more lived in the crowded, low stone buildings on the large farms or on the outskirts of the two towns, Tregaron to the north and Lampeter to the south where they worked in the wool mills. Most of the families in the valley were tenants on the large farms that grew stock animals and corn crops.

Jamie and Gareth were lucky, his mother told him. They lived in a house on land leased by their fathers, and they were sheep-raising families. Jamie knew she was right. Mr. Gwynne had told him and Gareth about the workhouse in Tregaron, where families had to live and do the work they were told to do because they could not afford to live elsewhere. In the valley were children work teams, walking along the road to the Somery farm to help take in a field of wheat or barley, or in the early winter, turnips. They were children his age, nine years, or even a little younger. They would never see inside a schoolhouse, his mother told him.

His mother had two great speeches. One was on everyone’s need for the chapel and its message, and the other was the cruel world of the deep pit coalmines where men, women, and children went down, deep into the earth, on a cable-lift and dug coal on their knees. Her father had died in a coal pit like that when a branching tunnel roof fell in. She swore that she would take a stick to Jamie if he ever spoke of going into the mines. Jamie did not want any part of the mines anyway; he hoped to work someday beside his father on the big sheep farm called Cartwool. Gareth always said he wanted to work in the wool mill with his father downriver in Lampeter. That would be later, however, after they had done their schooling and were twelve years old. Until then, for Jamie, it would be the chores with his father’s sheep, the schooling, and the chapel.

Jamie did not enjoy going to the chapel so often and sitting for so long. He didn’t think his father liked that either, but he went, every Sunday, day and night, and every Wednesday night. The preacher, Mr. Jones, even came one time to their house for Saturday dinner. Jamie remembered he had made his mother angry because he had spoken up to tell the preacher that the men like his father did not get enough pay and that they ought to tell the land and farm owners that,

and tell them they ought to pay more. He had spoken up because his father, as usual, would not. The preacher was as bad as his father, paying no mind to people who did not have enough to eat and had to work on some Englishman’s big farm because they could not lease enough land to raise their own crops or sheep. His father was too patient and would not speak up for the men who had no job or worked for a meager wage. Men like his father who leased a few acres still had to work on someone else’s farm to earn enough to feed his family. The men working on the sheep farms were no better off than the laborers in the woolen mills. Even with his wage from the sheep farm, his father could not pay for more than the barest of foods—mutton, flour, dried beans and potatoes—for the family table.

Well, the Preacher had said after Jamie’s words and a long silence save for the teapot hissing atop the iron stove, I guess young Jamie’s still learning the trials and tribulations of fathers trying to keep bread on the table. These are times that test men, even those molded in the image of Job. He had already learned as much as most his age. He glanced at his father who continued to fork a cube of boiled potato to his mouth with one hand and then bite at the hunk of broken bread he clutched in the other. Jamie knew he should eat and say no more.

That was the only time he remembered the Preacher coming to his house for dinner. Jamie knew his mother would like the preacher to visit more often. She liked to talk about what was in the Bible. It was her only reading. He recalled the day the preacher came. He had seen that his mother was happy that Preacher Jones was there. He looked at her light brown hair, as shiny as it was on Sunday mornings after her regular Saturday night hair washing. It shone now because she washed it last night, and this was Saturday, not Sunday. Her hair had a natural curl and she sometimes let Mrs. Pryse cut it a little. She didn’t keep it in a bun like most other chapel women did, but she would never hint at the haircuts to the Preacher, whether cutting her hair like that was the business of the deacons of the chapel or not. His father didn’t like her to cut her hair, but he had said that it was not a proper concern of the Preacher, the deacons or anyone else. Still, she held a mirror and watched closely when her neighbor took the little snips off the ends. His mother said she watched with some worry, not because of the deacons, but because Mrs. Pryse might cut too much at one time.

His mother’s Sunday school teachings to children his age were better than the Preacher’s sermons. Sometimes he imagined how it would be if his mother stood in front where the Preacher stands and preached to everybody. She would be better. He recalled the disappointment on his mother’s face at the end of that meal and the Preacher’s visit.

Mr. Jones, his father said in a voice not unlike that Jamie had heard him use at a meeting of mill and farm laborers, it’s been our pleasure to have you in our humble home. His father rose from his chair.

Would you share my tobacco in by the fireplace? He asked.

The Preacher rose, complimenting his mother on her fine meal and followed his father into the front room.

Jamie rose, relieved.

His mother rose, looking disappointed that her Saturday dinner was over.

That was a special time—when he was nine. It was when his schoolteacher, Mrs. Davies, took him and Gareth north to see Harlech Castle on Cardigan Bay. He and Gareth had never been beyond Tregaron or Lampeter, and they would be going all the way to the Cardigan coast in the west and north beyond Barmouth, which was where Mrs. Davies had lived before she came to teach at Ffodus Fforc. He knew that his teacher liked him—and Gareth, although his friend did not study as hard as he did and was not as good a student; even said he didn’t want to be. But his teacher liked Gareth. All the girls, and the women, liked Gareth.

He’s a mischief, Jamie’s mother would say. She liked Gareth too. They all liked his friend’s blue eyes and light brown hair that late in the summer was like ripe wheat on top. It had waves in it—like a girl’s. No one told Gareth that. Gareth didn’t like to get in fisticuffs, but Jamie knew that he could give a good account—he knew it through personal experience. Mrs. Corns bragged about the handsome dark hair and dark eyes of her husband and son, but that always seemed to happen after she spoke of the golden hair and blue eyes of Jamie’s best friend.

Mr. Gwynne drove the two boys north to Tregaron to begin their trip with Mrs. Davies. Both mothers watched the wagon, pulled by the bulky, gray Cob horse, cross the bridge and roll slowly by the white Ffodus Fforc Chapel. It was single story, made of river rock; box like, with a small bell-cote atop the roof. The whitewashed sides contrasted with the rich green field making it visible from the road at a distance north and south. Later in the summer, the field north of the chapel would be awash with bluebells, around patches of corn and barley.

Jamie sat on the wagon seat between Gareth and Mr. Gwynne as the Cob pulled them by Pye’s Pub, the onetime inn and now tavern only that stood at the intersection of the cart path from Ffodus Fforc and the valley road. Mr. Gwynne said the hedges along the road were older than any of the Ffodus Fforc buildings. They served as fences to sheep and cattle. Jamie’s mother called the hedges a refuge: a home for birds, small rodents, moths and butterflies, and flowers. Jamie could see the hazelnut bushes intermixed in the hedge. In late summer, he would come with Gareth and pick the sweet nuts. Sooner still, the flowers of the honeysuckle vines just coming to life would decorate the hedges. As the road ran along the riverbank, the yellow primroses popped out like stars in a dark evening. The primrose proclaim the spring, Mrs. Davies had said her first April at Ffodus Fforc.

Jamie had listened to his mother and father talk late the prior night about the wisdom of the boys going so far. He had heard his father remind her that it had been her—not him—who had eagerly agreed to Mrs. Davies’ suggestion. Jamie had lain in bed and listened to the voices from his parents’ bedroom upstairs. Right before he went to sleep he felt as if he wanted them to come down and tell him that he could not go. Now, as the wagon rolled north on the valley road, even with the threatening clouds above, he was glad they had not. He wanted to see Harlech Castle.

They stayed the night in the boardinghouse in Tregaron where Mrs. Davies had lived since she came to teach at their school.

Ffodus Fforc, she had said that first day at their little school. Why do they call it Lucky Fork? She asked. No one could answer and later the two boys found that their parents didn’t know either, and Gareth’s parents had lived nearly their entire lives in Ffodus Fforc. It was a small place, only the three houses, the school, the bridge, the chapel, and Pye’s Pub. The Pub drew the ire of the preacher in the white chapel. The owner, Mr. Pye, didn’t like Preacher Jones, at least according to Jamie’s father who visited the Pub on occasion. His dad told the story of the Sunday sermon that all present interpreted as a promise by the Preacher that he was going to visit the Pub and throw every barrel of ale into the street. Most people, his dad had said, didn’t think the Preacher would do that; still, Mr. Corns said, hardly a man of the chapel lifted a pint at Pye’s the following week. Pye spent the week sitting in the front door of the Pub swearing at the Preacher when he was not nodding off in sleep. Later Pye complained because the Preacher didn’t come, but mostly because the tall preacher had kept the members of his congregation away from the Pub for a whole week.

Of course, Jamie’s dad liked to say as he ended the now often-told story, Pye never came to Chapel, either.

CHAPTER TWO:

MRS. DAVIES

Their teacher introduced the two boys to Mr. Madoc, a tall, thin man in a black suit and long, black coat—the man who would drive them to Barmouth. A single gray horse in worn and frayed harness would pull the carriage.

I’m afraid this is no coach, Mrs. Davies, Mr. Madoc said.

We had that choice, and I would have taken a coach were I traveling alone, she said. But this gives us more freedom as we travel. I very much appreciate your kindness, Mr. Madoc. If you had not agreed to drive us as part of your selling trip, I could never have afforded this. The boys and I owe you.

I’m glad to help both you and the boys. He hesitated and stretched his arms in the cool, morning air. As he stepped up on the front of the carriage, he waved an arm to his side. Tregaron is a good place to start this trip. It’s a good town for young lads to look to learn a trade. There’re many shops, and I think the numbers will grow when the prices on cattle and sheep get back up to a proper level. In the homes and street shops there are maybe one hundred and fifty hosiers, a third as many tailors, and ten or twelve woolen manufacturers. There are many seamstresses, shawl makers, and at least a dozen hatters. You can get a fine, felt slouch hat here. Jamie looked at the rumpled, broad-brimmed and stained, black hat that Mr. Madoc wore. He guessed it was felt, hard-pressed fibers of wool, which could hold off the worst of the Welsh rains. Maybe Mr. Madoc would get a new one when the sale price for sheep improved.

Tregaron lay in the upper Teifi Valley, broad grassy meadows between the foothills with outcroppings of rock. The rock was much like those the townspeople had used to build the mills and houses, but the barren rocks showed more life and color than the buildings. The stones in the town looked darker, more like coal smoke and the morning rain clouds.

Mr. Gwynne had told them the evening before that Tregaron was on a corner of the world. To the north was Tregaron Bog, a huge wet expanse of peat that heaved like the top of a giant head. It had little value except to the gentry who owned guns and had the right to hunt the variety of wildlife there, mostly birds. To the east lay the higher reaches of the Cambrian Mountains, windswept and bare with heights well over two thousand feet. Mr. Gwynne, who called the mountains the roof of Wales, had some years back joined drovers here in Tre- garon and helped drive thousands of black Welsh cattle, some his own, over the top through the dreaded Abergwesyn Pass to markets in the borderlands with England. He said there was nothing but brown grass, moors, and pinnacle after pinnacle of mountains, and beautiful red kites, the hawk-like birds gracefully steadying their tapered wings on the strong updrafts. No people lived there, but a prettier sight he proclaimed no one was likely to see.

As they departed the town, Mr. Madoc’s bulky gray pulled them west, and a mist that wet Jamie’s cheeks and hands greeted their climb out of the Teifi valley into the fog layer that had left Tregaron an hour before they did.

They spent the first night on the coast at Aberystwyth and the two boys saw Cardigan Bay and the ocean for the first time. Then they continued north and east toward Machynlleth under skies holding only a small part of the clouds of the previous day.

We’ve been traveling up the Dyfi River Valley since midmorning, Mr. Madoc said. Pushing the horse a bit, but I want to get to Machynlleth by mid-afternoon. Jamie hadn’t noticed they were traveling any faster. They passed a small flock of sheep, the shepherd and a darting black and white border collie paying no heed to the carriage that had stopped as the sheep slowly moved to cross the road. They had a short time later seen a larger flock at a distance, upgrade and to their right, nibbling at the short grass in the midday splash of the sun. Sheep had always looked far better in a distant green field under fluffy clouds and a blue sky like today. They were not as pleasant up close, especially when their coats were wet. It was as if his father said about his rare brews of coffee. It tasted great but not a penny as good as it smelled when he ground it or brewed it on the stove.

His father didn’t talk that much—about anything. He would talk more easily about sheep than about anything else. He especially would not speak of the older family matters that Jamie wanted to know. Like before he was born and where he was born. His mother always sent him to his father when he asked about the times before his own recollections. He knew his parents had brought him from somewhere in southeast Wales, near the English border. His mother had been eighteen when they arrived in the valley. She had told him that. That meant his father was nineteen or twenty. She said their first year on the Teifi his father leased the house their house and nearly fifty acres of hillside pasture. Their flock was fifty strong before their first winter. When he asked her about that winter, she would not talk more about it. Neither would his father.

Mr. Gwynne and Mr. Pryse wanted his father with them during lambing, although Jamie saw lambing as a straightforward matter. After his first curiosity, he had no wish to be around at all. The ewes that they didn’t get into a shelter must have competed to see which could find the deepest gully or the hardest place to get a lamb out if there was trouble. He knew their neighbors said his dada was a good stockman.

His parents signed for their house yearly now and his father didn’t like that, because they had signed for five years on their first lease. He heard his father say that with only one-year leases, the landowners could up the price or lessen the acres any year and force a man and his family off the land and into the full-time struggle as a mill or farm laborer. Near their homes was grass that the large landowners did not allow his father and Mr. Pryse’s sheep to graze, but no rock walls or hedges told the sheep. Sometimes, Jamie helped shepherd them back from that forbidden grass. Mr. Pryse and his father were careful to keep their sheep off that grass and off each other’s grass, but they always dealt with each other in a friendly way. They could not graze the Cartwool land, including nearby grass that never had Cartwool sheep on it. The main section of the Cartwool farm was an hour’s walk from Ffodus Fforc. Jamie guessed his father held no complaint with his boss, Mr. Powel, who went to Mr. Jones’ Chapel, but it appeared that Mr. Gwynne didn’t like the little man. Jamie could tell that by the way their neighbor spoke the Powel name.

Mr. Madoc talked to the horse as it pulled the wagon around turns along the river. Each time, it seemed the stream was a little narrower and eventually gave way to steep-banked shallows where the water rushed down the grades between long, quieter pools of deep water. At one bridge crossing above such a pool, Mr. Madoc pointed to a small boat he called a coracle, a man sitting in it to fish the deep water. The boat looked a bit like the bottom half of a round hornets’ nest. The coracles, their driver said, were made from interlaced branches of hazel and willow wood covered with leather. Mostly net fishermen used them, but in the hands of skillful Welshmen, they were a stable means to move people and farm products across bodies of water. He said the English Army had used them to cross rivers hundreds of years earlier; no doubt, he added, with a Welshman in control.

Mr. Madoc stopped the carriage in Machynlleth in front of a long, two-storied building. The road in front of it was wide and could hold many people or carriages, but it was nearly empty. The building was an Inn. Jamie had never stayed in an Inn and he learned he would not stay in this one, where Mr. Madoc was meeting with his business friend. Mrs. Davies looked for her friends in whose house they were to be staying. The friends lived nearby, but Mrs. Davies could not recall the location of the house. Mr. Madoc went into the Inn to inquire about Mrs. Davies’ friends, and Jamie looked at the black timbers that slanted and crossed in the white, stucco sides of the building—half timbered his father called it. No building looked this fine in Tregaron.

Boys, there was for a short time a Parliament of Wales here in Machynlleth. She said it as if she had remembered it for herself, more than as a teacher. Jamie watched her, waiting for her to say more, but she did not.

When was that? Gareth asked. She was slow to respond.

A long time ago, but we’ll talk more about it tomorrow.

She looked tired, much more tired than she had looked yesterday at the end of a windy, rainy day. Jamie, on the other hand, felt fresh and excited, not at all tired.

The friends of Mrs. Davies arrived at the same time Mr. Madoc stepped out of the Inn with directions to their house. It was a short ride and later a long evening. Jamie and Gareth enjoyed the chicken and dumplings, but the two women talked of concerns of no interest to them, and the huge man of the house seemed not to like young people. Jamie thought it good that their hosts had no children.

He didn’t know why, but Mrs. Davies and her friend cried the next morning as they left. He saw her friend crying, but he didn’t see Mrs. Davies cry, but he saw her touch her cheeks with the white handkerchief with the fine lace at its edges. He saw spots of wet on it when she tucked it inside her coat pocket, and her eyes were red. Mr. Madoc looked back at Mrs. Davies shortly after they left the town, the gray pulling northwest up a steep grade.

Mrs. Davies, the boys are welcome to ride up by me if they’d like. That is, if it’s all right with you.

Jamie was by the driver’s side followed closely by Gareth before Mrs. Davies completed her okay.

Maybe she would stop sitting and looking far off like there was something there to see—when he could see there wasn’t anything. Maybe she would regain

her excitement about the trip more quickly if no one was watching her. That was how it was with him.

There was little talk. Mr. Madoc seemed to be leaning forward in hopes of helping the gray pull them along. Jamie asked if the horse could go faster, and the tall man told him the wagon and four people were a big load for the lone horse. He said if they had a lot of heavy baggage with them, he would ask their teacher and the two boys to walk up the steeper slopes. So far, that had not happened and Jamie hoped that it would not. He would like to walk—some, but he did not think his teacher felt like walking.

When Jamie first saw the open water again near Barmouth, he was sure it was the ocean—as big as the sky. As they went farther west, he realized they were alongside the large mouth of a river that had been narrow and shallow when they crossed it early in the day. Now the two banks of the river moved even farther apart as the wagon moved west along the north bank. They turned north and looked out beyond the river’s mouth at Cardigan Bay again. To him it was an ocean. Two ships were sweeping along the surface, their tops white with sail. Closer to land, several ships lay quietly in the water with no sails showing at all.

Look at all the ships, he said.

Look at all the water, Gareth said.

That’s Barmouth shipping you see out there, Mr. Madoc said. They have all types of ships that carry wool out of Barmouth straight to South America.

Does your selling have anything to do with wool? Jamie asked.

Everything. I arrange for the sale of wool by farmers to the mills and for the sale of the milled goods to shops.

The last part of the trip was in darkness. Mr. Madoc had the boys move back with Mrs. Davies after the golden sunset. He didn’t think Mr. Madoc even noticed the beauty of it, and Jamie was not about to detract from the driver’s concentration on the road. Later, he sat by Mrs. Davies and gladly sharing a blanket that she hugged around him with one arm and around Gareth with the other. Surely, Mr. Madoc could only see far enough to concentrate on the sturdy gray’s swishing tail. He had confidence in Mr. Madoc, but he wished the man had a name for the horse. Jamie had asked about the name and decided it was wrong not to know the name of a horse. He hoped the horse was named Old Steady, or Sure Foot, or Bat.

* * * *

She shook him softly.

Jamie, we’re here. We’re home.

He thought she was his mother, but then he saw her face in the light of a flickering lamp. The lamp didn’t move. It was on a post and beyond it stood a man, smiling and handsome wearing a shiny tie, white shirt, and large black coat that went to the top of his shoes. He looked dressed for Sunday Chapel. Gareth stood beside him, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

She shared a big hug with the young man.

Jenkins, this is James Corns and Gareth Pryse.

He hoped the young man would not hug him, and he didn’t, but he extended his hand for a shake. Jamie had practiced shakes with Gareth, but he had never done it for real. It felt good even though he was unable to close his fingertips around the side of the big hand. Despite the sleepiness of the hour, Gareth’s white teeth reflected the flickering light as he shook the big man’s hand and smiled at Jamie. It was as if his handshake were better.

Then they were in the house. Mr. Madoc and Jenkins shook hands again, and Mr. Madoc was gone with the gray. Jamie guessed the horse had done fine, and he was going to give him a name. Jenkins carried in the bags and when he took off the big coat, he looked taller and slender. Mrs. Davies must have thought he looked good. She kept looking at Jenkins and smiling.

Boys, let me show you our library, Mrs. Davies said after dinner. She guided them to an open door at the end of the front room, letting them walk in first. Jamie stopped one step inside, and Gareth pushed against his back. All four walls held shelves of books. There was a window in the wall to his right, but bookshelves held volumes above and below it. All the shelves were almost full of books. A few, little spaces contained metal cups, a variety of shaped and colored rocks, a few miniature paintings of buildings, and drawings framed like the paintings.

Tomorrow, you must feel free to come in here and look around at all these books. Too bad neither of you read English.

That was unfair. He was doing well in his Welsh, which was more than Gareth could say; but how would she think either of them had time to learn to read English; especially when it was not allowed in their little school house—or in Sunday school at the chapel.

Well, no mind, she said. You may want to read some English books someday. There are many books here written in English. You should feel free to take any of those you’d like. You must remember that we have limited space on the carriage. You’ll need to choose wisely.

When she left, Gareth picked up a book like a thick newspaper. It had drawings, but Jamie was not sure what it was about. It was in the English language. Jamie looked at the books in the shelves. He would not know how to decide what to keep. Gareth tossed the large paper book toward him, and he picked it up. It was full of drawings of clothing for men and women and children. Gareth sat on the floor and looked around the walls, but it was not a look of interest.

Don’t want any of these books, Gareth said.

You haven’t even looked at them.

Yes I have. Can’t even read what it says on the covers. Well, maybe a few. Don’t want any of them.

Jenkins came in and said he would show them where they would sleep.

This used to be my room, Jenkins said, as he pushed the bedroom door open. An oil lamp already lighted the room. It shone magically on a clutter of models: bridges, houses, stores, churches, and two sailing ships. Jamie didn’t want to stop looking.

I’ll give you two minutes and then I’ll be back to turn out the light, Jenkins said as he left, closing the door.

Jamie knew they should hurry, and didn’t reply. They had barely pulled the covers up over their shoulders when Jenkins returned. He put out the light and walked out.

I’ll leave your door open. I’m right down the hall. Goodnight, boys.

CHAPTER THREE:

HARLECH

Well, that’s Harlech Castle, Mrs. Davies said.

And we’re still a mile from it, Jenkins said. They had driven north up the coastline from Barmouth for most of the morning. The sky was a mix of high clouds and light blue, but as they neared Harlech, clouds draped the distant Snowden Mountain peaks.

Jenkins looked up at the castle as he held the reins and guided the black horse pulling their carriage.

"King Edward I built the castle five hundred and fifty years ago. It was one of several he built in Wales to keep Welshmen in our place. The two tall matching towers at the front gate and the other four towers at the corners are still nearly their original height. The whole castle seems even taller sitting on that high rocky ridge.

The water of the bay used to come up to the base of the ridge, but the sand dunes have filled in where the bay was.

Jamie looked at the dunes between the castle and the water splashing lightly against the shore. How far is the ocean away from it now?

Maybe a half mile, Jenkins said.

Did the king live here? Gareth asked.

No, but princes did.

Owain did, Jamie said.

Yes, said Mrs. Davies. Owain Glyn Dwr lived here for a time, and one of the two Welsh Parliaments he assembled was right here. There has been none since. One was at Machynlleth where we were yesterday. The one here was in about fourteen hundred and four.

Jenkins pulled on the reins and the handsome black horse with one black and three white feet stopped at the foot of the hill below the front gate of the castle. The chaise only had one seat, and Jamie and Gareth snuggled between the two adults. It was a shiny way to travel. Everything was bright and black, like the horse: the cloth, the metal, even the leather harness. The chaise belonged to Jenkins, but he had rented the horse. Jenkins knew the horse well, and his name was Comet, the same name as the great Welsh racing pony that Mrs. Davies had told them about in her first year at Ffodus Fforc.

As they climbed the hill and entered the wide castle gate, Jamie wished he were visiting the castle with only one adult. Jenkins was a builder, as his father had been, and he talked about the stone and the design at the top of the wall, and the doors that once stood here. Mrs. Davies talked of people and happenings, and the names of those who had stayed or lived here. They took turns telling about Harlech Castle. They walked across the ground that had once been a water moat in a deep stone ditch with a drawbridge. They went through the bare gateway and climbed the stairway inside the wall until they got to the top platform, or battlement, as Jenkins called it. Gareth didn’t show much interest in the castle, but he seemed to listen closely to their teacher tell of the people who had been there. Jamie liked Jenkins’ words about the great number of men and the many months taken to build the castle. He wondered if it were possible for Gareth to have no interest in such an important building.

The castle once had three baileys, or walled areas. The wall of the outer bailey went all the way into the ocean. There was a sea gate by which boats delivered supplies and soldiers right to the castle, Jenkins said.

The castle held out for about seven years in the 1460’s against the forces of the Duke of York in the Wars of the Roses, Mrs. Davies said.

Did you tell us about that? Gareth asked.

No, but you’ll learn about it, probably next school year. You know, our national fight song, ‘The March of the Men of Harlech,’ was inspired here by the defense of the fortress against the Duke of York. Jamie had known only the song, not where and how it started, but he didn’t say so. He glanced at Gareth who was looking with great interest at their teacher.

Jenkins then began explaining a lintel and an arch. Jamie said it was like having or not having flat feet, and Jenkins looked at him approvingly. He listened closely to all that Jenkins was saying, and he acted as if he understood more than he did, but someday, he would. Jenkins explained that the east wall, where the main gate was located, was most vulnerable to attack because of the higher ground of the mountains to the east. There the walls were nine to twelve feet thick. The gateway originally had several gates, or barriers. There was one large timber that the guards lowered like a latch, two huge, hinged doors, and three large interlaced iron and wooden barriers that they raised and lowered by windlasses and ropes. Jamie wished the moat and drawbridge were still present.

Did the Duke of York’s men ever take the fortress? Gareth asked.

Yes.

I don’t see how, Jamie said. He looked over at Gareth for some sign that maybe Gareth knew, but his friend looked straight ahead, seeming to wait for more from their teacher about the men who fought here.

Jenkins began to explain the attack. Jamie didn’t understand parts of it, but he was not going to ask. Not with Gareth ready to flash that big smile as if he knew the answer. Jamie was leaning out to look over the side, but boards kept him from getting too close. He guessed the crumbling of the tops of the walls was the reason. He had to agree with Jenkins. They had been good builders in those