Place:Rhosllanerchrugog, Wrexham, Wales

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Rhosllanerchrugog (also spelled Rhosllannerchrugog,^[1] or simply Rhos) is a village and community in Wrexham County Borough, Wales. It lies within the historic county of Denbighshire. The entire built-up area including Penycae, Ruabon and Cefn Mawr had a population of 25,362.

History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

The village was originally within the ancient parish of Ruabon and the township of Morton Above (i.e. Morton, or moor town, above Offa's Dyke) or Morton Wallichorum (the Welsh Morton). In 1844 Morton Above, along with part of the neighbouring township of Dynhinlle Ucha, became part of the newly created parish of Rhosllanerchrugog.

The Llanerchrugog estate itself was owned by the Jones family from at least the 1400s to the 19th century; in 1649 the landowner John Jones of Llanerchrugog claimed a detailed genealogy going back 2400 years to Dyfnwal Moelmud, and attempted to use his ancient rights of ownership to argue he should be exempt from taxes.

The development of the village can be attributed largely to the coal seams of north-east Wales that pass near it. The burgesses of Holt were granted the right to dig for coal at Rhos in their borough charter of 1563.^[1] A coal mining community was established during the 18th century, and grew substantially from the 1840s onwards.^[1] Unlike many other mining villages in the district and in other parts of Wales, the majority of early immigration to Rhos was from Welsh-speaking upland agricultural areas in West Wales, giving the village a distinct linguistic identity which it has retained until the present day. The proportion of Welsh-speakers in Rhos did not fall below 50% until the time of the 1981 census.

By the early 18th century the Rhosllanerchrugog mines were the property of the future Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn, 3rd Baronet, of Wynnstay, a member of the area's major landowning family and a prominent Jacobite. At the accession of George I in August 1714, Williams-Wynn incited the miners of Rhos to march to Wrexham, singing Jacobite songs, to sack two Dissenting meeting houses, to smash the windows of Whig tradesmen and to prevent the bells of Wrexham church ringing to celebrate the accession.

The available notes of Mr Kenrick, minister of the New Meeting, dispute many of these assertions. In Wrexham, it was on July 15, 1715 (before George I's accession), that Tory resentment overflowed into riots that were mainly directed at the Dissenters. The New Meeting House was destroyed and the Old Meeting House was badly damaged. The colliers came into town on July 20, 1715 to help and protect the rioters. Upon request from the Dissenters, Watkin Williams-Wynn interceded and persuaded the men to desist. Sporadic rioting continued, at least until October 20, 1715, which was the King's Coronation Day.

The Jacobite politics of the district's landlord and his tenants is popularly thought to be the source of the nickname "Jackos" or "Jacos" still applied to inhabitants of Rhos.

A symbol of Rhos' coal-mining and labour movement heritage is seen in the "Stiwt", the miners' institute in Broad Street. This was erected and paid for by the miners, during the general strike of 1926, as, a social and cultural centre for the community. The Welsh Religious Revival of 1904 also had a major impact on Rhos. The cynghanedd "Beibl a Rhaw i Bobl y Rhos" ("a bible and a spade for the people of Rhos")^[2] reflects the importance of both coal-mining and the chapels on the village's culture and heritage. The later strength of Nonconformity in Rhos became one of the village's distinctive features, along with its dialect, working-class institutions, and tradition of education, which for decades meant that no school in the area "[seemed] complete without a teacher from Rhos on the staff".

Rhos hosted the National Eisteddfod in 1945 and 1961, and the Celtic League was founded there in 1961 during the Eisteddfod. The many informal fringe performances around this event were memorialised in the poem "The Cross Foxes" by Harri Webb, remembering the night when in Rhos "we drank the pub dry".

With a population of over 10,000, the modern community of Rhosllanerchrugog is one of the largest in Wales. The 2011 census showed that the population of the built-up area of Rhosllanerchrugog including adjoining Pen-y-cae is 13,501.^[3] The area retains a proportion of Welsh speakers above the national average, despite the loss of older speakers and the impact of non-Welsh speakers moving into the area: the 2001 Census showed that 31.5% of the community area was Welsh speaking, declining to 24% at the 2011 census.^[4] Welsh medium education is, however, popular and significantly increasing in the area.

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