The Sealed Knot Society | The English Civil War

Family Background
The eldest Son of Sir John Owen of Bodsilin, Walsingham's secretary, and of Elin (later Lady Eure), grand-daughter of Sir William Maurice. He was born in 1600 at Clenennau, near Dolbenmaen, Caernarvonshire, his mother's home. He later married Janet, daughter of Griffith Vaughan of Cors-y-gedol, Merioneth and had some military experience before succeeding to Clenennau on his mothersí death in 1626. He was sheriff of Caernarvonshire in 1630-31 and of Merioneth next year.

Civil War Breaks Out
A Captain in the Irish expedition in 1640, when the civil war broke out he was put on commission of array for Caernarvonshire (10th August 1642) and commissioned by Charles to raise and equip from county funds a regiment from the three shires of Gwynedd. Hampered by opposition from a few neighbouring families, he was not able to put his recruits into the field until the following summer.

He was at the siege of Bristol, where in command of Grandison's Tertio under Rupert he was wounded in the face. He recovered to command his regiment in the campaigns of the Oxford Army, and served as deputy governor of Reading of late 1643.

After the successful invasion of Wales by Sir Thomas Middleton, Owen was summoned to Oxford, where the King made him governor of what became "frontier garrison" of Conway (10th December 1644), and a week later, a Knight. His regiment served on with the field army under its Lt. Colonel Roger Burgess.

His First Military Task
On the 17th of February he was commissioned as Sergeant Major General of Foote under Lord Byron (Governor of Chester). His first task was to meet Threats to Denbighshire and Flintshire, which had developed during the winter, but after a diversion in Lancashire had drawn the invaders off in May, he was able to attend to the defences of Gwynedd. Supplies were sparse and the local gentry slow to co-operate, partly from that fear of military rule and occupation that found a spokesman in Archbishop John Williams who, after lavishing his resources in organising local effort and equipping his native Conway as a depot protested against his suppression by an interloper from the wilds of Eifionydd.

Byron sought a compromise but in May (with authority from Rupert) Owen forcibly entered the castle, appropriating its contents and denouncing the Archbishop in terms that drew a rebuke from the King himself.

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