Читать книгу The History of Oswestry онлайн

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On this “vexed question” we may add the following:—“Remarking to a gentleman,” says Mr. Hutton, “that I had gleaned some anecdotes relative to Oswald, he asked me if I had seen Old Oswestry, where, he assured me, the town had formerly stood. I smiled, and answered him in the negative. He then told me, ‘that the town had travelled three quarters of a mile to the place where it had taken up its present abode.’ This belief, I found had been adopted by others with whom I conversed.”

The earliest sovereign possession of Oswestry, noted in the Welsh historic page, was in the beginning of the fifth century, as already referred to. Oswal, son of Cunedda Wledig, is there represented to have been its first monarch. The Welsh Chroniclers, however, furnish no details of his reign; and no event connected with the town is subsequently recorded, till the memorable one of King Oswald’s attack upon the Mercian King Penda, August 5th, A.D. 642. Oswald and Oswy were sons of Adelfrid, the seventh King of Northumberland. These young Princes had been driven out of the kingdom of their father by Cadwallawn, who had before been expelled from Wales, his rightful possession, by Edwin. Oswald, after seventeen years’ exile in Scotland, was restored to his kingdom by the overthrow and death of Cadwallawn. During his exile Oswald is said to have been baptized in a Christian church. He brought with him from Scotland a Christian bishop, Aidan, who preached Christianity to the people, and Oswald assisted him in his ministrations. The young Northumbrian King appears to have been zealous in the Christian cause, both in the pulpit and the field. Penda was a pagan prince, and had united with Cadwallawn in laying Northumbria waste. Oswald’s Christianity was not strong enough, it would seem, to subdue his revenge against Penda. The two monarchs at length met, a bloody conflict ensued, and Oswald was slain. The site of the closing scene of this memorable battle is said to have been a field called Cae Nef (Heaven’s Field), “situated on the left of the turnpike road leading to the Free School.” The writer from whom we quote mentions, that “Oswald approached with his army to what is called Maes-y-llan, or Church Field, then open.” “About four hundred yards west of the church,” he adds, “is a rising ground, where the battle began. The assailant appears to have driven Penda’s forces to a field nearer the town, called Cae Nef. Here Oswald fell.” These minute particulars give increased interest to the combat; but the writer does not state any authority for the details. We suppose it must have been merely traditionary. At the present time the sites of Cae Nef, and Church or Chapel Field, are well known to most of the inhabitants of the town. Oswald’s remains were first interred in the monastery of Bradney, in Lincolnshire, and afterwards, in 909, removed to St. Oswald’s, in Gloucestershire. The memory of the deceased King seems to have been held in great veneration, for churches, in various parts of the kingdom, still bear his name, as patron saint. Speed, in his “History of Great Britaine,” with his accustomed quaintness and minute graphic description, sums up Oswald’s closing scene in the following language:—