Trifter

This journey begins where the Kerry Ridgeway footpath crosses the B4368 near a Forestry Commission Wales picnic area. There are some beautiful views from here. In the winter it can be bleak and windswept but on a lovely summer day the view is of wide open spaces, fields, sheep, clumps of conifers, very few people and one small lizard footling around in the grass at my feet. Or is it a baby Welsh dragon? A buzzard has just taken off from a fence post by the road and circling to gain height is making its way towards Beacon Hill doubtless looking for something for lunch.

These are the Kerry Hills at the edge of the Clun Forest and the border between Wales and Shropshire is not far away. All is very quiet and peaceful today. It wasn’t always so as like much of the border country between Wales and England it has seen some violent and bloody action in the past.

To the north and west and so towards Newtown in Powys and the hills of Wales I am looking over the valley of the River Severn. There are lots of small streamlets draining off these hills and running down to join the Severn but I am not going to be in their company today. It will be 80 miles (130km) and a drop of about 1600 feet (490m) before I see the River Severn again.

Turning my back on Wales, which is a safer thing to do nowadays than it was in the centuries past, I will follow more small dribbles and streams which, as they reach the valley floor below, become the River Teme.

The Teme is one of our most beautiful rivers and its clean pure water has made the whole river a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). This first upper section is fairly shallow and fast-flowing, bouncing over its stoney bed. Bushes line the banks and sheep drink from it while dippers and wagtails bob around hunting for food.

The young river runs down its open valley between rounded hills and past the villages of Felindre, Beguildy, Dutlas and Knucklas to cross the border into England near Knighton. This is sheep country and, with little industry along the banks of the river, agriculture and its related activities are the mainstay of the economy along with some retail and office work in the towns. It is also a place for artists, writers, walkers and a good many retired folk.

Knighton stands on the Dyke built by the Mercian King Offa. The Dyke is a long earthwork consisting of rampart and ditch which effectively defined the border between Wales and England. The Saxons and Welsh had fought over the town for many years but the Welsh held it when the Normans arrived around 1075 and built a stronghold nearby. The struggle between the Welsh and English for control of the area went on however. Llewelyn the Great ruled in 1215 then the Mortimers took control on his death in 1240. They were faced by a hostile Welsh population and Llewelyn II regained power but the
Mortimers came back. The revolt led by Owain Glyndwr in 1402 led to further battles.

Nowadays Knighton is a bustling market town with some very steep narrow streets and surrounded by hills and woods. It is an attractive and very popular place to visit.

A mile or so to the northwest is another mound, Knucklas Castle which legend suggests is the site of a castle built by the father of Guinevere. She and King Arthur were married here, or so it is said.
The valley closes in downstream of Knighton where the village of Brampton Bryan and its castle sits in the gap between Coxall Knoll and the hills of the Brampton Bryan Estate. Coxall Knoll, topped with an Iron Age hillfort, is one of several places claimed to be the place where the Celtic leader Caractacus fought his last battle against the invading Romans.

Caractacus, or Caratacos to his people and sometimes Caradoc to us, was a charismatic leader who united the many small Celtic tribes or family groups to fight the Romans. He was eventually defeated and captured then taken to Rome and paraded before the Emperor.

Brampton Bryan castle in the centre of the village guarded a very important route from Ludlow up the Teme Valley past Knighton and so into central Wales. There is evidence of the occupation of this area in Roman times and several Iron Age hill forts can be found within a few miles radius. Saxons and Normans hunted in the forests and the area was also the haunt of Edric the Wild. He was a local folk-hero who fought just about anyone and everyone whenever he felt like it. Sometimes he fought with the Welsh, sometimes with the Normans and other times against both. Brampton Bryan was recorded in the Domesday Survey as belonging to Ralph de Mortimer. In 1172, Hugh de Mortimer and Bryan de Brampton founded the Abbey at Wigmore.

The River Teme near Brampton Bryan

The Mortimers were a powerful, land-grabbing family some of whom married into Welsh families. Gwladys, a daughter of Llywelyn the Great was a Mortimer bride. Some might say this was a cynical way to pacify the Welsh but it worked the other way too. Owain Glyndwr captured Edmund Mortimer and pursuaded him to marry one of his daughters before releasing him.
The family were major castle-builders in the Marches and some of them are particularly associated with Wigmore castle nearby. The visible remains at Wigmore today are largely the work of Roger de Mortimer who, created Earl of March in 1328, managed to have quite an effect on English history.

Between the years 1321 and 1331 he rebelled against Edward II, escaped from the Tower of London and went to France with his mistress, Queen Isabella, the King’s wife who was known as “The She-Wolf of France”. They invaded England, deposed the King and plotted his murder at Berkeley Castle. For three years after the murder of Edward II, Isabella and Mortimer ruled as Regents.
As soon as he achieved his majority in 1331, Edward III, son of Isabella and Edward II, had Mortimer arrested and, despite the pleas of the Queen, had him hung, drawn and quartered at Tyburn.
Edward spared his mother a similar fate but banished her to Castle Rising in Norfolk where she spent her last 27 years, never seeing her son again.

The 13th century castle at Brampton Bryan was built by another Bryan but then his line died out without male issue. Margaret de Brampton married Robert Harley in 1309. The Harley family which also gave its name to Harley Street in London has owned the estate and lived in the village for the 700 years since. Fighting during the English Civil War almost destroyed the castle but some remains dating from the 13th to 17th centuries have been maintained in the gardens of the present house.

Most of Herefordshire’s great families were Royalists but Sir Robert Harley was an exception. He spent much of his time in London dealing with parliamentary duties leaving his wife Lady Brilliana to run the family and the village. A royalist force surrounded the castle in July 1643 and Lady Brilliana took the entire village into her home for protection. There was just one casualty among the castle’s defenders but they killed about 60 of the royalist army. The royalists withdrew and Lady Brilliana’s fame spread far and wide. The strain weakened her however and she died a month or so later.
The castle was finally taken in the spring of 1644, sacked, burned and left a ruin but when the royalist cause was finally lost the Harleys claimed compensation and received the then huge sum of £13,000. A few years later, during the 1660’s Sir Edward Harley built a new house which was incorporated into the present home of the Harleys in Brampton Bryan.

The river used to run south from here but twenty thousand years ago the area near Wigmore was dammed at one end by ice to form a glacial lake which blocked its route. Eventually the Teme forced its way to the north-east and now flows quietly on its present course. A few miles further
downstream it is joined by the River Clun also flowing down from the Kerry Hills. Together they flow under the bridge at Leintwardine, claimed to be the site of the Roman outpost of Bravonium.

The Bridge at Leintwardine

The Roman army had a hard time with the Silures tribe hereabouts and it is unclear whether Leintwardine was primarily a civilian or military settlement. It was certainly on Watling Street, an important Roman road, and a staging post on the route between the main Roman cities of Chester (Diva) and Caeleon (Isca) in South Wales. Some of the foundations of the Roman Town are covered by the church now but some years ago a stone believed to be from an altar to Jupiter was found.

Today Leintwardine is a lively village with a nationally famous butchers shop, one of the best unspoilt pubs you will find in Britain and a resident coracle maker. The river, sometimes slow, sometimes rattling over gravel beaches and rocks meanders on through lush farmland and woods towards Ludlow. Its waters are still pure and clear and now there are signs that otters have returned. These waters, the Leintwardine Fishery, are jealously guarded by anglers.

There have been many industries based in the woodland here. Coppicing produced wood for charcoal to fuel iron making which went on here from Elizabethan times and many oaks were felled to build ships. It took 40 to 50 acres of oak wood to produce a ship of the line in the 18th century.

Just downstream from Leintwardine the river enters the Downton gorge with more traces of Roman occupation but this area is better known for its iron-master, Richard Knight. Richard Knight was born and raised in Shropshire and having started building his fortune in the iron trade, married and moved to this corner of the Teme valley. At that time iron was produced using charcoal burnt in small furnaces having bellows worked by water power. This area with its coppice wood and the river was perfect.

The local industry had been started by the Earl of Essex in about 1595. The Harleys of Brampton Bryan were also involved. Richard Knight made a huge fortune and became one of the great names among ironmasters. He also owned two furnaces in Shropshire, one in Staffordshire and was owner or shared in almost all the ironworks in Worcestershire. His descendents went on to buy more land and estates including nearby Croft Castle and one of them, Richard Payne Knight, built a huge stone castle on the hill above Knight’s original Bringewood Forge at Downton and landscaped the grounds in the picturesque fashion of the time.

Richard Knight died in 1749 and there are some wonderful cast iron tombs of the Knights which can be seen at the church in nearby Burrington. The manor of Burrington was held by Edric the Wild at the time of the Domesday Survey.

The Teme, here the scenic haunt of otters and kingfishers, sweeps calmly on. Sometimes it moves peacefully along green leaf-reflecting stretches where you can see coiling weeds and the shadows of ripples on the stoney bed. Other times it speeds up and there are small whirlpools where the water flows over underwater rocks or spills over small weirs or ledges of rock. The occasional heron surrounded by gnats and dragonflies stands watching the water .

Archaeological digs have found signs that people have been living at Bromfield for the past 5,000 years. There were beakers and pits from the Neolithic Period and a Bronze Age cemetery. The Romans had a large marching camp here around 48-75AD and an Anglo-Saxon cemetery has also been found. A Benedictine Priory was founded in the 12th century but only a gatehouse added in the 14th century remains. Nowadays the river is joined here by the River Onny and flows by some restaurants, outliers of Ludlow’s food culture, and then on past one of the most magnificent sights on its whole route.

Ludlow Castle and Weir

Ludlow castle was begun by one of those Marcher Lords, Roger de Lacy, in the 11th century then enlarged during the 14th century to become a magnificent palace for one of the most powerful men in England at the time, Roger Mortimer. He’s the one from Wigmore Castle mentioned previously. You can imagine the medieval pagent and ceremony that took place here. The castle came into the hands of Richard, Duke of York, in the 15th century and became embroiled in the Wars of the Roses. There was a major battle a few miles away at Mortimers Cross when in February 1461 the Yorkist army under Edward, Earl of March defeated the Lancastrians. He was soon to become Edward IV and in 1472 he imprisoned the two princes, who later became known as the “Princes in the Tower”, at Ludlow castle. For many years this was also the centre of government for Wales and the Border Counties.

In 1501 Prince Arthur, brother of Henry VIII, lived here with his bride, Catherine of Aragon, before his tragically young death and later between 1525 and 1528 Queen Mary Tudor spent three winters at the castle. Ludlow castle fell into decay after all this activity until bought by the Earl of Powis in 1811 and it remains in his family.

Ludlow is one of those places that seems to have everything needed for the good life. It is a working town serving a large rural area yet is “steeped” in history and tradition. Perhaps I should say “marinated” as it has become renowned for good food and slow living. It has all the arts and heritage you could need, lots of small shops and businesses and the view from Ludford bridge upstream or down could not be bettered. There were watermills here to provide power to process local wool and overlooking the river is Whitcliffe Common where fossils show it was once part of a tropical sea in the Palaeozoic period.

The river is very much a part of Ludlow although fishermen and canoists compete for the space. A favourite kayak trip is to launch over the bank below the castle, pass through several rapids and over weirs, under the busy A49 and railway line to finish at Ashford Carbonell where a small but dangerous weir usually means lifting out for a lunch break. With any luck at appropriate times of the year you may see salmon leaping the weirs in the opposite direction.

Ashford Carbonell was named from the Carbonel family of Normans but there has been a ford here for much longer. It is now a quiet, peaceful village but was once on the pack-horse route from Wales to the river Severn at Bewdley.

Just downstream is the tiny village of Ashford Bowdler with its church, St Andrews, perched high on the river bank. So close to the bank was it in fact that in 1906 the entire chancel collapsed into the river. The chancel was rebuilt but by 2001 it became obvious that major work was needed. A new enlarged retaining wall had to be built to encase the original one to make the church safe.

The river passes Little Hereford where St Mary Magdalene church has a marvellous Norman tower and Burford’s gardens to flow under the medieval bridge, which was updated by Telford following flood damage in 1795, at the “Town in the Orchards”, Tenbury Wells. As well as its fame for fruit trees the town became popular for the mineral waters discovered in the 1840’s. James Cranston designed the Pump Rooms in the 1860’s and Tenbury Wells thrived. The apples, pears, plums and quinces may not be harvested so much now but a fine crop of mistletoe and holly is auctioned each Christmas.

Just a little way downriver from Tenbury Wells the river runs close to the A456 and driving here just after dark one evening I glimpsed a blur of brown feathers, a Tawny Owl, and felt it skid across the roof of the car. I stopped and went back to check if it was hurt but couldn’t see it on the road. Hearing a rustle of leaves in the tree overhead I looked up then dodged smartly to one side as a load of owl-poo hit the ground. I’m not sure if it was a nervous reaction from the owl or an act of revenge but he seemed ok so I left the scene quickly.

Much of the river here is claimed by one fishing organisation or another and one treads quietly and carefully along the bank when anglers descend for competions. The coarse fishing is excellent and the Teme is famed for its barbel. I have never met a fisherman who is also a canoist. The two are utterley incompatible. Neither can see the point of the existence of the other. It is a pity as a canoe would be the perfect vessel to explore this part of the river but anglers always seek to ban them.

The Shelsley Walsh area certainly isn’t quiet, at least not on race days. This is the venue for the oldest motorsports-venue-still-held-on-its-original-course in the world. The noise is incredible when cars accelerate from 0 to 140mph while climbing the steep hill which they can do in 20-odd seconds. Some cars, the historic ones, do it just a little more slowly.

The river glides on through a lovely deep lush valley with high banks on each side and passes ancient churches and old houses in charming villages favoured by the retired as well as those who commute into Worcester or even Birmingham. This is a floodplain and floods are becoming more frequent. Tenbury Wells knows this to its cost having suffered flooding on many occasions. Most habitation keeps its distance, the river being overlooked by villages like Clifton on Teme, originally an Anglo-Saxon settlement on an old salt route between Droitwich and Leominster. Then Martley with its Norman church and the birthplace of Charles Hastings, founder of the British Medical Association.

These seemingly timeless rich fertile fields of pasture, cereals and hops have been farmed for centuries. Knightwick, for example, was granted to the church in Worcester in 851 by Beorhtwulf, King of Mercia and earlier still in about 786 land at Broadwas was granted to the same chuch by another King of Mercia, Offa. He of the Dyke back near Knighton. Broadwas is in a loop of the river which sometimes floods the nearby meadows. The church of St Mary Magdalene sitting in a hollow near the river has traces remaining from 1170. The villages of Upper Wick, Lower Wick and Rushwick are on the edge of the flood meadows where fertile soils supported orchards, hop fields and smallholdings. Several cider mills were in action near Broadmore Green.

The Battle of Worcester took place in 1651. The Royalists waited in this area near the Teme for the Parliamentarians to arrive. Cromwells strategy was to cross the Teme and cut off any Royalist escape to the west then force them into the city where they would be surrounded. The Parliamentarian army crossed the Teme probably at a loop in the river near Bransford Court and the Royalists were soon in retreat. This was crucial to the outcome of the battle and so to the history of the British Monarchy.

On and around Powick Bridge, further downstream on the Teme, had been the scene of the first skirmish between Royalists and Parliamentarians on 23rd September 1642. This was also the site of the last major battle on 3rd September 1651. Cromwell had sent reinforcements over bridges of boats built near the confluence of the Teme and Severn. His greater numbers and superior tactics eventually defeated the Royalist army many of whom were from Scots regiments. These Scots were involved in the fighting at Powick Bridge and many were killed. Somewhere between 2,000 and 4,000 Royalists were killed along with about 700 of Cromwell’s army during the Battle of Worcester. About 10,000 Scots were taken prisoner and many transported to the New World. Some escaped and made off to the hills in the west. A group of them are said to have followed the River Dore up the Golden Valley in Herefordshire and stopped to rest by the river. You can imagine them lying on the grass and perhaps soaking their aching feet in the river. Tragically, just at that moment a passing Welsh force ambushed and slaughtered the lot of them. Where they rested and died was called Scotland Bank and is still marked as such on the map today.

The Memorial Plaque on Powick Bridge

It seems likely that apart from a few small craft and ferries the only commercial traffic on the Teme was along the short stretch between Powick and the Severn. The Bishop of Worcester owned two watermills in this area from 1086 which were involved in grinding grain to make flour.
There was a coal wharfe near Powick bridge and in the 18th century pig iron was carried up to a forge at Powick Mill. Large water-powered hammers were used to turn out bar iron much in demand for the emerging industries of the period.

By about 1760 they were producing sheets and rods of iron to supply, among others, the nail making factories. During the 19th century a mill here was used to grind materials for Worcester porcelain. A hydro-electric power station was built next which helped to light the streets and homes of Worcester from 1894 onwards. It was the largest power station of its type when opened and was later extended to include coal-fired steam turbines as well for when the water levels were too low.
This last section of the river now flows between high banks with flotsam stuck in the bushes after the floods, lots of rippling swirls and eddies and the wind ruffling its surface with catspaws.

Leaving thoughts of fighting and flooding, castles and commerce behind, I have come to sit on the bank where the Teme and Severn meet. The water simmers and whirls where their currents meet. I can hear the sound of the water flowing past, feel the wind blowing through the bushes and hear birds singing. A kingfisher just flew past, a tiny missile, a small slither of a rainbow shooting upstream. Sir Edward Elgar sat here listening to just these sounds and taking in the same sights (perhaps without the large plastic powerboat that just went by) while thinking about his latest composition. He loved this place so much that at one time he requested his body be cremated when he died and the ashes scattered at the confluence of these two rivers.

In the event he was buried next to his wife at St Wulstan’s Church in nearby Malvern Wells. His birthplace at Lower Broadheath is also just a short distance away.

A large fish breaks the surface in the evening light and leaves a glittering sparkling shimmering swirl of water in its wake, just gentle bands of bright water spreading out as some swallows sweep by but such a beautiful and gentle end to my journey.