CLOUGH
of
Plas Clough
,
Glan-y-wern
,
Bathafarn
, and
Hafodunos
(
18th and 19th cent.
).
During the 17th cent. the descendants of
Sir
Richard
Clough
(q.v.)
lived quietly in
Denbighshire
, providing the county with successive
sheriffs
and the county town with successive
aldermen
. Towards the middle of the
18th cent.
a fresh accession of ambition and
business ability enabled them to absorb through marriage or purchase the estates of the
Thelwalls
of
Bathafarn
, the
Powells
of
Glan-y-wern
, and the
Lloyds
of
Hafodunos
, and so to provide for a succession of enormous families, several members in each generation going up to the universities and achieving some local eminence in clerical, legal, or military circles. Of the thirteen children of
HUGH
CLOUGH
(
1709
-
1760
), three followed him to
Oxford
and one,
HUGH
CLOUGH
(b.
1746
) went to
Cambridge
and became
Fellow of King's
, a friend of
Cowper
and
Hayley
, and himself a minor
poet
, but died young. The youngest,
ROGER
CLOUGH
(
1759
-
1833
), after leaving
Oxford
, m.
Anne Jemima
Butler
of
Warminghurst
,
Sussex
(sister and coheiress of his elder brother's wife and — descended from the
Dolbens
of
Segrwyd
, q.v.
), coupling her name with his own. Presented to a
Sussex
living, he exchanged it for
Gwyddelwern
(
1791
), then
Corwen
(
1797
), and sold her
Sussex
estate to buy
Bathafarn
in his own county. He was made a
canon
of
S. Asaph
in
1793
, a
J.P.
c.
1794
, and a
common councillor of Denbigh
in
1802
. As
magistrates
he and his brother and fellow-
canon
Rev.
TOMAS
CLOUGH
(
1756
-
1814
) —
alderman
(
1794
), and later
rector
(
1797
) of
Denbigh
— took vigorous action in putting down serious riots in the town against methods of raising the local militia for the
French war
(
1795
). His flair for business appears in his work from
1792
as an
agricultural improver
— much praised by
Gwallter Mechain
(
Walter
Davies
, q.v.)
and recognized by the
gold medal
of the
Society of Arts
(
1807
) — on his farm of
Eriviat
and the
Bathafarn
estate, and also in his association with
David
Mason
(
Ystrad Uchaf
),
Rev.
J. Lloyd
Jones
(
Plas Madoc
), and his own nephew and son-in-law
Richard Butler
Clough
(whose wife
Catherine
inspired the dedication of
Old Colwyn church
, near the family seat of
Plas Min-y-don
) to found at
Denbigh
(
c.
1794
) one of the pioneer banks of
North Wales
. Its failure during the slump of
1814
involved the sale of other industrial properties in which the partners had invested, and the payment in full of the creditors (
1822
) meant a heavy drain on
Clough
's inherited fortune and that of his wife. Luckily most of their ten children were already started on professional careers or prosperously married; the second son,
JAMES
CLOUGH
(
1784
-
1844
), set up as a
cotton merchant
in
Liverpool
, and acquired vicarious fame through his two children
ARTHUR
CLOUGH
(
1819
-
1861
), the
poet
, and
ANNE
CLOUGH
(
1820
-
1892
),
pioneer of women's education
and
first principal
of
Newnham
, both of whom resided for a time at
Min-y-don
(now destroyed).
[On the brief connection with
Hafodunos
, see under
Lloyd
,
John
(
1749
-
1815
)
.]
Bibliography:
-
J. E. Griffith
,
Pedigrees of Anglesey and Carnarvonshire
Families
, 1914
, 329-30, 369;
-
J. Williams
,
Ancient and modern Denbigh a descriptive
history of the castle, borough and liberties with sketches
of the lives, character and exploits of the feudal
lords
, Denbigh, 1856
, 280;
-
The Records of Denbigh and its Lordship
bearing upon the general history of the county of Denbigh
since the conquest of Wales ; illustrated with many gems of
Welsh mediæval poetry never before published
,
1770
, 171-2;
-
Thomas
,
A History of the Diocese of St.
Asaph
, i, 360, iii, 199;
-
Foster
,
Alumni Oxonienses
, i, 266;
-
William Davies
,
General view of the agriculture and domestic
economy of North Wales containing the counties of Anglesey,
Caernarvon, Denbigh, Flint, Meirionydd, Montgomery. Drawn
up and published by order of the Board of Agriculture and
Internal Improvement
, London, 1810
, 261;
-
Economica
, London
,
1926
, 22;
-
The North Wales Gazette
,
12 Dec. 1822
,
27 Feb. 1823
;
-
Bulletin of the Board of Celtic
Studies
, iv, 61-73;
-
Oxford Dictionary of National
Biography
, xi, 127;
-
J. I. Osborne
,
Arthur Hugh Clough
, London, 1920
,
1920
;
-
B. A. Clough
,
A Memoir of Anne Jemima Clough
, London,
1897
,
1897
;
-
Proceedings of the Llandudno and District
Field Club
, Llanfairfechan, 1906-1953
, xx, 24.
Author:
Emeritus Professor Arthur Herbert Dodd, M.A., (1891-1975), Bangor
