Over 200 people lost their homes.
Once a settlement of dozens of farms, a pub, cemetery and over 200 residents whose ancestors had worked the land for generations, it was rendered silent within just months. Its historic community disappeared, leaving behind abandoned dwellings and missing livestock. Most of the properties didn’t survive much longer.
In September 1939, following the outbreak of World War Two, an Army officer turned up to inspect this isolated part of mid Wales. By Christmas, every farm received notifications, telling the shell-shocked occupants they had until April 1940 to leave their family homes. The Ministry of Defence had designated the area’s 30,000 acres as a training facility. The local population was told that their sacrifice was vital to the war effort and they would be compensated for their disruption.
With bombs already dropping, the War Office was in urgent need of extra land and resources. For a brief moment in 1940, the predominantly Welsh-speaking community thought they had convinced the MoD to reconsider its proposals, reports the Express. Yet, as Hitler’s Nazis swept across Europe, London rejected the distressed community’s appeals, ordering them to find new homes elsewhere to raise their families and care for their livestock. Sadly, the 54 farming families who were forced to leave had few nearby options and many were obliged to relocate away from the region.
Many believed this upheaval would be short-lived and they would come back once the war ended. Yet, the MoD still owns the 30,000 acres of Mynydd Epynt to this day, now called the Sennybridge Training Area, which continues to be used for training and live firing by British troops.
Almost all of the original buildings, including the farmhouses, have been destroyed but The Drovers Arms Inn pub still stands, alongside the headstones in the graveyard. These are practically the sole traces of the families who lived there 80 years ago in what was more a settlement than a well-defined village. Whilst satellite imagery on Google Maps shows a small network of roads in the location, many cannot be accessed via Street View.
‘We’ve blown up the house — you won’t need to come here anymore’
In 1940, families clung to the hope they would ultimately stay – or at least come back. As late as March of that year, St David’s Day celebrations took place at the chapel, known as Capel y Babell. One man, Thomas Morgan, was reported to make frequent trips back to light a fire in his hearth, safeguarding the stonework from weather deterioration until his family’s expected return. He kept up this daily routine until two soldiers approached him with heartbreaking news: his home had been destroyed. They told him: “We’ve blown up the farmhouse. You won’t need to come here anymore.”
Bethan Price, a descendant of one of Epynt’s families, disclosed her great-grandmother left a key in her front door lock, never relinquishing hope of returning. Yet others acknowledged the finality of their exit. One woman even demanded her front door be removed when she left the village. For numerous residents it signalled the end of an era, their familiar world vanishing forever.
In June 1940 the school and chapel closed their doors, the Army started dismantling hedges, and on 1st July 1940, heavy artillery bombardment began. According to NFU Cymru, Elwyn Davies, aged 10 at the time, recalled his grandmother’s forced relocation, eventually settling in Carmarthenshire: “It was a very sombre time. It was war time, and there weren’t many options locally. Just a week after she left, they flattened her house. They flattened everything.”
Iowerth Paete, who formerly worked as curator at St Fagans National Museum of History, was sent to capture the event through his lens. He recalled observing horses pulling carts laden with possessions along the road departing from the village, and an elderly woman crying as she sat in a chair outside the home she was being forced to leave.
Current MP Ben Lake, whose grandmother Beryl Lake was the last baby born at Epynt, told NFU Cymru: “The takeover of the Epynt 80 years ago is a significant but often overlooked chapter in the history of Wales. An entire community was displaced, and families had to vacate farms that had been farmed by their ancestors for generations.”
However, despite the anger felt at the time, expressing dissent was viewed as weakening the war effort and the Allied fight against Hitler. As a result, the forced evacuation of Epynt never gained the same historical recognition as, for example, Capel Celyn in Tryweryn Valley, which was deliberately flooded in 1965 to provide drinking water to Liverpool homes.
In fact, eight decades on, Epynt’s memory has faded – much like the engravings of its former residents etched into the weathered gravestones at its 19th century chapel.
Can I visit Epynt today?
People can discover the Epynt Way via several walking trails of varying lengths where “sheep roam freely on artillery ranges and red kites soar above troops on exercises” but “the sound of the wind is punctuated by booming mortars”.
The Epynt Way visitor centre, located in a traditional farmhouse, provides advice to visitors: “If you see any military debris, don’t worry, you are safe but please don’t pick things up. You may see soldiers training but you are more likely to see red kites, hares and other wildlife.”
