The Black Vengeance

A disgruntled and fanatical Welshman rises against King Owain of Wales in an attempt to drive the English from Prydain entirely.
Huw the Black (Huw Ddu ) was a minor landholder in the South Wales Valleys, an area of Wales that had suffered greatly at the hands of English occupation over the years of war in Britain. His family had suffered numerous injustices and misfortunes at the hands of the English and he felt the plight of his fellow Welshmen enormously and saw each injustice against his countrymen as an affront to himself.
Huw took an active part in King Owain's campaign, leading a force of Welshmen from his stronghold at Senghenydd to harry and disrupt English supply lines throughout South Wales and was present at The Battle of Shrewsbury, where he was able to use his lightly armed warriors to storm the Town of Shrewsbury and divert a number of English units from the main battle line.
Following the end of Glyndwr's wars against the English and the foundation of the Brythonic Tripartite - Huw Ddu felt enraged by King Owain's largess to the English and show of mercy by allowing them to retain lands in Prydain. He felt Owain, being the now dominant Lord in the land, should have enacted vengeance against the enemy Lords and their peoples for centuries of atrocities during the Occupation of South Wales by the English.
In homage to Dafydd ap Gruffudd , on Palm Sunday of 1416, Huw gathered his small bodyguard at one of King Owain's hunting lodges near Kidderminster and launched simultaneous raids on the English lords of Northumbria and England. Razing the settlements of Gloucester and Stafford. On the same date, his brother Alun Wyn-Gadarn , a Sheriff of Cardiff released hundreds of prisoners from Gaols across South Wales and rallied them to his brother's side.
Alun Wyn was said to be a giant of a man, as muscular as he was tall and a danger with his great axe. He commanded the freed prisoners in support of his brother and fanned the flames of rebellion westwards into Welsh heartlands rallying support. He initially spent a few weeks attacking English-owned homes across South Wales.
Before word could reach King Owain of his insubordination, Huw had quickly moved to defeat an English force outside Worcester and seized the Fortress there. His army left not one Englishman alive in their wake, and sent all English survivors fleeing before them. Huw declared that the rebellion would drive the English completely from Prydain, and those who would not leave voluntarily had chosen to die.
King Owain, now aware of the seriousness of the revolt, which appeared to be growing in strength and stripping many of his garrisons in South Wales of manpower, Owain sent a delegation to meet the rebel at Evesham, a once famous site during Simon de Montfort and the Baronial Rebellion against Henry III and Edward I of England.
The day before the meeting with King Owain's delegation, Huw Ddu's army was met, and defeated by a force of Northumbrians outside Warwick Castle. However, as his forces retreated back to Evesham for the meeting, Huw's army was unexpectedly joined by a large contingent of soldiers from Carmarthen, led by Trahaearn Wyndod , who had pledged their support to him. Huw sent Trahaearn, with the newly strengthened army to seize Oxford and to slay any living English they met on their way while he awaited his King's delegation at Evesham. It was at this point that Alun-Wyn's force from South Wales arrived to reinforce his army. Buoyed by the reinforcements that had arrived to aid him, Huw sent monks to each of the Abbeys in Wales to rally support to his cause. Men trickled in from every corner of the land to join him, if they could avoid King Owain's patrols along the highways.
Owain ordered his liegeman to stand down the rebellion or have his lands confiscated. He was also ordered to pay a "iawndal" to many of the English Nobles to make amends for his crimes. The price of which, despite the wealth Huw had gained from his raids, was crippling. A total of 30,000 marks, to be paid in quarterly installments.
Enraged, Huw dismissed the King's delegation and sent them home on foot to Machynlleth. He would refuse his King's requests and added that if "King Owain were not man enough to exact revenge for the injustices done to his peoples, then the men of Wales deserved a King who would always put them before others." - A blatant, and open challenge to the authority of the King. As he did so, his army was bolstered further by soldiers from Cornwall and Gwynedd under the commands of Brochvael of Cornwall and Emyr Fychan, Lord of Caergybi.
With Huw and Trahaearn now setting much of middle-England ablaze and slaughtering thousands as they went, King Owain mustered his forces. There would be a reckoning with this insubordinate young fool, but this time there would be no offer of peace and certainly, no mercy.
As the young rebels from South Wales continued their bloody "cleansing" of the land, Huw set his sights on the key strongholds of London and Nottingham. Splitting his burgeoning army in two - he marched on London, while Trahaearn advanced North to Nottingham.
Huw Ddu's forces met a large army raised by Roger Mortimer and his vassals on a field near Runnymede who barred his route to London. It was here that Huw's force was further strengthened by an army under the command of Anarawd ap Eifion of Gwynedd.
Trahaearn's forces, met by the still buoyant army of Northumbria beneath the walls of Nottingham, prepared for battle.
King Owain of Wales, raced from Machynlleth in a desperate attempt to halt the impending carnage and try to repair as best he could the now strained relations between the Three Kingdoms.
As Huw and Mortimer's forces faced each other across the marshes of Runnymede, a messenger arrived with word that King Owain's forces were quickly approaching. Huw, in a quite extraordinary feat of maneuvering, was able at the last possible moment, to pull his army from the field to leave the confused King Owain staring down his fellow King Roger Mortimer on the other side of the Marsh.
The rebel Welshman turned his forces quickly towards St. Alban's and raided further into East Anglia. The bulk of his forces fortifying the Town and building additional defenses against the approaching Welsh and English armies. He dispatched a messenger to Trahaearn to enquire of his progress, and waited to decide his next move. All the while, continuing to "cleanse" the Land of his Fathers from the unwelcome English.
Trahaearn's forces at Nottingham had swept aside the Northumbrian army and was besieging the Garrison in the Keep of the Castle when Huw Ddu's messenger arrived. Fearing that the loss of their figurehead would demoralise the rebellion, he left a token force to keep the Northumbrians inside their fortress and turned his army South. He cleared the road to St. Albans for Huw and the two men's armies rejoined to face down their pursuers.
With the net closing in, Huw, following discussion with Trahaearn and their Lieutenants - realising that support for their enterprise was waning and that justice was fast approaching, decided that they would sooner meet their ends in Wales, and not in the lands that would no doubt eventually be returned to the English. With a final effort, the two rebels fled back towards Wales, keeping themselves ahead of the incandescent Welsh King Owain and Roger Mortimer and made their stand on the old symbolic border between England and Wales, Offa's Dyke.

"Here, on the ancient border between our people and the invaders of Prydain, the Saeson, we final few Brythoniaid will make our stand against the weak King Owain and his new English puppets. Let us, the Children of this Land fight here for the righteousness of our cause and for the spirits of our forebears who suffered much at their hands. Let all who pass here know, that Wales lived, or died on this day. FOR Y BRYTHONIAID!" - Huw Ddu, prior to the Battle of Offa's Dyke (December 1416)

Huw's forces waited, encamped on the zenith of the Dyke for their foes to arrive. Cunningly, he sent Trahaearn and a force of archers into the nearby woodlands to harry Mortimer's advance and whittle down his army from the undergrowth.
As King Owain's forces arrived at the place of battle, shortly joined by the depleted and exhausted English army under Mortimer, Huw gave a final order to his army that no Welshman would be killed by their hands. All of their efforts were to be concentrated on the English force under Mortimer and only a stubborn shieldwall was to engage with Glyndwr. In fact, it was reported that he ordered the men in the Shieldwall, under the command of his son to put down all their weapons and advance only with their shields in order to minimise the loss of Welsh lives.
The battle that ensued was bloody. The reluctance of the rebel forces to engage with Glyndwr's armies confused the Welsh King's men and the rebels left flank was kept in relatively good order. The bulk of the rebel forces surged upon the ragged English army and inflicted heavy casualties. Llywelyn ap Huw who was commanding the shieldwall frustrating Glyndwr's army was slain with a swords thrust through a gap in the shieldwall, which slowly began to break under the furious assault of the Welsh King.
Huw Ddu, leading the assault against the English army, forged a path towards the heavily armoured and mounted bodyguard of the King. Along with Trahaearn and his remaining Lieutenants, they launched a furious assault on their enemies and succeeding in capturing a number of warhorses and causing havoc among the English lines with false reports of Mortimer's death.
As the rebel generals rode across the battlefield, Huw Ddu ordered his remaining soldiers, who were now hard pressed by Glyndwr's attack on the left to stand down and surrender to the Welsh King. The Rebel and his companions rode away from the battlefield and into the recesses of North Wales. The surviving rebel generals, who were leading the stubborn, yet non-threatening shield wall against Glyndwr put up their arms. Alun Wyn-Gadarn, Anarawd ap Eifion and Emyr Fychan were all taken prisoner by the King and sent to the keep at Cardiff Castle to await trial.
However, Glyndwr could not help but be somewhat impressed by the rebels dedication to the cause - and the fact that his armies had suffered few casualties in the campaign. He pardoned many of the fighting men, though ordered them conscripted into his armies to be disciplined and reformed. He placed a bounty of a thousand marks on each of the heads of the remaining rebels. Sparking a rush of bounty hunters and fortune-seekers to the wilds of North Wales.
The still very much alive Roger Mortimer, after celebrating the victory - argued with Glyndwr for vengeance against his depleted armies and desolate lands.
From Nanhysglain, a still largely unknown estate, the Rebels continued their resistance for a few short weeks into 1417, harrassing English merchant caravans and diplomats who travelled the Welsh highways. Huw Ddu made plans to strengthen his forces once again and raid English lands from Chester. He sent messengers to disaffected Welsh lords across Gwynedd and Powys in a final attempt to exact his vengeance. A monk named Ithel ap Meurig, based at the cathedral in Bangor had promised to rally support on his behalf and meet him on the road to Chester with an army.
Huw sent Trahaearn along the coastal roads with his bodyguard and what remained of his renegades while he travelled the main highway to Chester with a small guard and a number of holy men. However, when he arrived at the appointed meeting place, Ithel's promise had been a ruse and a large force of constables and soldiers barred his route. They fell upon Huw's small band and scattered them. Barely escaping with his life, Huw fled back to Nanhysglain and sent word to Trahaearn to return immediately.
The net was closing in. Huw and Trahaearn needed another plan.
It was a green army in training, under the command of Iago ap Iestyn, a young recruit in Glyndwr's army who was training his men in the mountains of Snowdon. The Welsh rookies overwhelmed the now ragged rebel lords and cut them down in their turn. Believing, by their appearance, the men to be mere outlaws and brigands.
The cessation of the rebellion went largely unnoticed by many in Wales. King Owain had only ordered further investigation into the fate of the outlaws once the periodic raids on traders along the North coast had ceased. When a number of bodies were discovered at Nanhysglain, they were believed to be the mangled trunks of Huw Ddu and his men, though by the time the King's men arrived the bodies were badly decomposed and bare. King Owain merely ordered the men buried and declared his success in putting down the revolt by throwing a banquet for himself and his English and Northumbrian allies at a newly renovated hall in Senghenydd, written in history as, the Feast of Senghenydd.
It was shortly after this disturbance, that the Lords of Cornwall began to rail against their English overlords and thus beginning the Cornish War of Independence.

Conflict Type

Military Campaign