| The Story of Saint Winefride |
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According to legend, Winefride, also called Gwenfrewi, and Guinevra, was the daughter of a wealthy resident of Tegeingl, in Flintshire along the coast of north Wales, in the early middle ages. She was the niece of the local bishop, St. Beuno. She was abducted from her hut in her village by Caradog of Hawarden. As her captor dragged her down the hill to his boat she struggled. He gave up and in anger cut off her head. Her uncle, Bishop Beuno, heard the cries and came running. He put the head back onto her body and she came back to life. But where the head had fallen there appeared a spring of water which became Holywell, one of the most popular pilgrim sites in Wales.
A few years later Winefride became a nun of the convent of a double monastery at G'yytherin in Ciwyd. She became Abbess and died there fifteen years after her miraculous restoration to life.
Holywell became the most important pilgrimage site in Britain in the 6th and 7th centuries even through her relics were taken to England and enshrined at Shrewsbury.
Holywell has been a shrine for almost 1500 years. It was spared destruction during the Tudor persecution of Catholics because it was the favorite shrine of Lady Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII and grandmother of Henry VIII, who made her descendants promise to honor St. Winefride. Today it is still a beautiful shrine and an impressive spiritual site.
Photo by Carl Yee
Winefride could well have been one of the favorite saints of Saint Edward the Martyr for during his lifetime Holywell was the biggest shrine in Britain. She is honored on June 22nd the anniversary of her attack and restoration to life, and on November 3rd, her feastday.