page_title: Angle, Pembrokeshire
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Angle, Pembrokeshire / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Stack Rock, Milford Haven This is a photo of listed building number 82592.
context_page_description: Angle is a village, parish and community on the southern side of the entrance to the Milford Haven Waterway in Pembrokeshire, Wales. The village school has closed, as have one of the two pubs, the village shop and St Mary's church. There is a bus link to Pembroke railway station.
  The Sailors' Chapel, a Grade I listed building, is in the church graveyard.
  At Castle Farm, there is a Pele tower and above Castle Bay there are the remains of an Iron Age fort. On the headland there are visible remains of medieval strip farming.
context_section_description: A Pele tower was built by Robert de Shirburn in the 14th century. It is within Castle Farm but can be easily accessed. The castle may have been built by the Shirburn family during the time of Owain Glyndŵr. A French army landed at Angle in 1405 to assist Glyndŵr. Some sources see the castle as a simple pele tower but others see evidence of a moat and another tower and regard what survives as being the remains of a larger castle.
  In the 19th century, it was reported that 388 people lived in the village with the women involved in plaiting straw for bonnets and mats, whilst the men would trawl for oysters when they were in season.
  In the same century, many forts were constructed around the Milford Haven Waterway—Angle has four—Thorne Island, East Blockhouse Battery, Chapel Bay and Stack Rock Fort. Their construction was at the behest of Lord Palmerston following a Royal Commission.
  The chief landowners in Angle were the Mirehouse family for many generations; descendants of John Mirehouse of Brownslade, Pembrokeshire, who purchased the Angle estate from the Kinner family for £29,000 shortly after 1800. The family later made The Hall its main seat after extensive refurbishment in the 1830s. John Mirehouse was appointed High Sheriff of Pembrokeshire in 1831, and Lt. Col. Richard Walter Byrd Mirehouse served as High Sheriff in 1886.
  By 1886, John Mirehouse's descendant, Lt. Col. Richard Walter Byrd Levett of Staffordshire, graduate of Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, had taken the surname of his mother's family and had settled in the village. Lt. Col. Mirehouse lived at The Hall, where his descendants continue to live today, and where he embarked on making improvements to the estate and the village. This included constructing a number of buildings; one being the castellated, eclectic, colonial-style Globe Hotel; once the main village hotel and still a prominent feature in this Victorian estate village.
  The Mirehouse estate included Cheveralton Farm and Hubberton Farm. The family also owned the Golden Estate in Pembroke and Wallaston Farm in Pembroke St. Mary. Councillor John Allen-Mirehouse of Angle currently serves as Pembrokeshire County Council Deputy Leader.
  During World War II, RAF Angle was located on the Angle Peninsula Coast. It was operational from 1 December 1941 to the 1950s, having been used by both the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy.
  The sheltered beach at West Angle Bay has been designated a Site of Special Scientific Interest; the rock pools are home to a small green starfish called Asterina phylactica. The starfish was only formally identified in 1979.
  On 15 February 1996, the oil tanker Sea Empress grounded at the entrance to the Milford Haven Waterway, spilling 72,000 tonnes of crude oil.
  The coastline around Angle was severely damaged. The effect of the oil spill lasted several years and cost £60 million.
caption: Stack Rock Fort, Angle
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