Flint, Wales - Encyclopedia

GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES

FLINT, a municipal borough and the county town of the above; a seaport and contributory parliamentary borough, on the south of the Dee estuary, 192 m. from London by the London & North-Western railway. Pop. (1901) 4265. The seat of great alkali manufactures, it imports chiefly sulphur and other chemicals, exporting coal, soda, potash, copper, &c. The county gaol here, as at Haverfordwest, occupied an angle of the castle, was removed to Mold, and is now Chester Castle (jointly with Cheshire.) Flint Castle was built on a lonely rock by the riverside by Edward I. Here met Edward II. and Piers Gaveston. Edward III. bestowed its constableship upon the earls of Chester, and here Richard II. surrendered to Bolingbroke. It was twice taken, after siege, by the parliamentarians, and finally dismantled in 1647. There remain a square court (with angle towers), round tower and drawbridge, all three entrusted to a constable, appointed by the crown under the Municipal Corporations Reforms Act. Made a borough by Edward I., Flint was chartered by Edward III., and by Edward the Black Prince, as earl of Chester.