Hawarden, where Gladstone’s Library is situated (see posts in the past week) and where Gladstone and his wife lived, is a village in Flintshire, North Wales.

Main street:-

Gates to Hawarden Castle:-

Hawarden Post Office and side street. I got a flicker of deja vu at the road sign pointing to Queensferry. For a moment I thought I was back in Fife:-

Over the road from the Post Office and near to the gates above lies the Gladstone Memorial Fountain, erected by locals to commemorate the fiftieth wedding anniversary of William Ewart Gladstone and his wife, Catherine:-

The upper inscriptions on the three sides read in total, “Drink ye the water of life.”

Last September we made a trip down south, mainly for the good lady finally to see Rye in East Sussex.

However, our first stop was at Gladstone’s Library, Hawarden, Flintshire, Wales. Yes, it was William Ewart Gladstone‘s Library (his second in fact, his first was a tin tabernacle on the same site) but it also now doubles as a hotel and meeting/conference site.

Stitch of main building frontage:-

Ground floor corridor to Gladstone Room:-

On the wall of the Gladstone Room was a photograph of the original tin tabernacle library:-

Gladstone Room:-

The other end of the corridor leads to the Theology Room where Gladstone’s books on Theology are kept:-