Andrew Galloway visits the site of a military invasion
PEMBROKESHIRE HAS a wealth of prehistoric features, some easier to locate than others. Leaving my car at Goodwick
Sands, I climbed the steep path heading north-west towards the village of Llanwnda. After some scrambling around on the westward flank of a rocky hill I discovered the well-preserved Neolithic burial chamber known as Garnwnda or Carreg Samson. Evidently situated by our prehistoric ancestors to exploit the magnificent views across the headland, the weighty capstone has withstood the full onslaught of Welsh weather for an estimated six thousand years, supported by a
single upright stone.
In a field no more than a hundred metres to the south, I came upon a majestic menhir, or standing stone, almost seven feet in height. As was common in the medieval period, both the burial chamber and the stone became associated with a Christian saint, in this case Saint Gwyndaf Hen, a nominal 6th Century Welsh cleric.
The 13th Century church in the village also bears his name but is now more famous for being the church allegedly sacked by French soldiers during the attempted invasion of 1797.
Soon after dark on 22 February 1797 four warships of Revolutionary France approached the Welsh coast and, dropping anchor off Carregwastad Head, began to put ashore troops. Under the command of Colonel William Tate, an Irish-American who had fought the British during the American War of Independence, the invasion force comprised fourteen hundred soldiers from the Seconde Légion des Francs, more commonly known as La Légion Noire because of their habit of wearing captured British uniforms dyed black.
Despite initial advances, discipline amongst the
French ranks began to quickly collapse. La Légion Noire being partly a penal battalion, many of the troops were convicts, irregulars and Royalist prisoners who, taking advantage of the night-time landing, disappeared into the Welsh countryside to loot local properties. Those soldiers who broke into St Gwyndaf ’s church constructed a bonfire from Bibles and pews in order to stave off the cold whilst others discovered a stash of wine that had been recovered from a Portuguese cargo vessel wrecked on the coast some weeks earlier. Thus the French lines were soon depleted.
At daybreak on the following morning the inhabitants of the town gathered along the cliff tops to observe the stand-off between the French and the British on Goodwick Sands. Many of the local women wore the traditional Welsh costume of red shawl and black hat. Legend has it that seeing the women lined up along the cliff top from a distance the French mistook their costumes for uniforms of regular infantrymen and assumed themselves to be outnumbered.
Colonel Tate prevaricated for as long as he could, but was eventually forced to surrender to the British forces just after lunch, thus bringing to an end the last military invasion of the British mainland.