Search results for ""author tim butters""

For centuries visitors to Monmouthshire have been seduced by its picturesque landscape and breathtaking beauty. Poets, princes, priests, peasants, painters, politicians, and even pirates have all sung the praises of this unique little corner of Wales. It is a county with an elusive nature and a turbulent past, but one whose sublime splendour is evident in its surrounding hills, scattered castles, sleepy churches, rolling rivers, rising mists and ancient woodlands. William Wordsworth once famously described Monmouthshire as the place where ‘the heavy and the weary weight of all this unintelligible world is lightened’. In 50 Gems of Monmouthshire local author Tim Butters takes an illuminating journey along the high and low roads of one of the UK’s most popular counties in search of the landmarks, the historic curiosities and the natural wonders that make this little patch of the UK so magical to both visitors and residents alike. Among the places the author visits are the romantic ruins of Tintern Abbey, the Skirrid on the edge of the Black Mountains, the Monmouth and Brecon Canal and the Kymin hill, with its spectacular views of Monmouth and the eighteenth-century Round House and temple in honour of British naval victories.

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Secret Abergavenny offers a unique insight into the sleepy Welsh market town, proving that there’s a lot more to the ‘Gateway to Wales’ than meets the eye. Did you know that Adolph Hitler’s deputy Rudolph Hess was kept in the town under lock and key during the Second World War, or that Abergavenny was declared its own nation in 1404 by Ieuan ab Owain Glyndwr in an arrangement that lasted approximately two weeks. John Lennon once landed there by helicopter to play a gig with the rest of The Beatles at the town hall, and Marty Wilde was so infatuated with the place he wrote a Top 40 hit called ‘Taking a Trip up to Abergavenny’ to express his love for the ‘paradise people’ who lived there. Local journalist Tim Butters takes the reader on a fascinating journey through the town’s past, introducing us to the likes of Potato Creek Johnny, credited with finding the largest gold nugget in the Wild West, as well as more nefarious characters such as ‘Abergavenny Alice’ who personally beheaded seventy Irishmen in revenge for killing her Norman lover. It’s fair to say that for a little town, Abergavenny has a big history, and a lot of it remains largely unknown. Now’s your chance to find out more.

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Monmouthshire may have a reputation as a quaint, idyllic, rural county but scratch the surface and you’ll find a past riddled with scandal, strife and murder most foul. In Monmouthshire Murders and Misdemeanours Tim Butters digs up and throws new light on criminal cases long since buried, but still capable of making our modern minds recoil in horror. Among these tales of terror and woe you’ll find the wretched account of a child who callously murdered other children with the calculated ease of a born psychopath, a penniless and alcoholic prostitute butchered by the hand of a disease-riddled madman, a wandering vagabond with a penchant for opportunistic butchery, and a Spanish sailor who killed an entire family on a whim. This hellish history also contains tragic tales from those condemned to the desolate confines of the workhouse, the delirium of the asylum, the despair of the prison cell, and the unforgiving grasp of the hangman’s noose. So step right this way for a chilling tour of Monmouthshire’s brutal and bloody past. Dare you take a walk on the dark side of this fair county?

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