Site Record

painted by J. varley 1803.

Additional: Sold at Christie's, 1937; now in the National Museum of Wales. The watercolour shows the archbraced central truss of a windbraced hall still open to the roof. The early fireplace with crenellations has been inserted in the lower end of the hall; a portion of a dais canopy can be glimpsed at the top right of the watewrcolour. This was clearly a high-status hall.

The Blackmoor Head (the 'Black') may survive in some form. It seems that the `Black? and King's Head were separate pubs but next to each other. The King's Head was demolished in 1970s. However, according to a potted online history of the pubs of Rhuddlan, in the early C20th the Black had been incorporated into `what is now known as Fondella Building?. The Fondella Building still survives and there is a Coflein entry for it (NPRN 410936). It seems to have been a hall and cross-wing range. The hall is much altered (this must have been the Blackmoor) but the cross-wing (`Bryn Awel?) survives, apparently with an archbraced truss.

RFS/RCAHMW/June 2019