VAUGHAN, ARTHUR OWEN (Owen Rhos-comyl ; 1863?-1919), adventurer and author;
a native of the Vale of Clwyd. When a boy, he ran away to sea (from Portmadoc), and became a wanderer. In the Boer War, he led a troop of horse (‘Rimington's Guides’), and acquired note; and in the 1914 war he rose to be colonel and D.S.O. Two novels of his were The Jewe of Ynys Galon, 1895, and The White Rose of Arno, 1897; and he collaborated with lord Howard de Walden in a drama, The Children of Don, 1912. His historical books, Flamebearers of Welsh History, 1905, and The Matter of Wales, 1913 (a more ambitious work), have not met with the approval of professional historians. He d. 15 Oct. 1919 at a London nursing-home, aged 56 as it is said.
Bibliography:
- The Times, 17 Oct. 1919;
- West. Mail, 16 and 20 Oct. 1919;
- Rhyl Journal, 25 Oct. 1919;
- Blackwell;
- N.L.W. MSS. 2504-5.
Author:
Sir William Llewelyn Davies, M.A., LL.D., F.S.A. (1887-1952), Aberystwyth
Corrections and additions:
VAUGHAN, ARTHUR OWEN (DWB, 1001).
This was an adopted name; his baptismal name was Robert Scourfield, s. of Robert Mills and Jane Ann, daughter of Joseph Scourfield; b. at Southport, 6 Sept. 1863. His father was buried less than a month later. His mother moved to Manchester and remarried. Her second husband, Luke Etchells, d. in 1869. The child was brought up by his grandmother who came originally from Tremeirchion. She called him Owen. He himself adopted the name Arthur Owen Vaughan and formed his pseudonym ‘Owen Rhoscomyl’ from Rho[bert] Sco[urfield] Myl[ne] using the Middle English word for mill. He m. Catherine Lois (Katherine Louisa) de Geere on the bank of the river Vaal c. 21 Dec. 1900. His certificate of marriage was lost when he was admitted to hospital. She d. at Penarth in 1927. The regiment in which he served during the South African War was the 14th Northumberland Fusiliers.
He was the author of two other novels, Old Fireproof (1906) and Battlement and Tower. [1896].
Bibliography:
- His papers are at the National Library of Wales, uncatalogued.
- See further Hywel Teifi Edwards, I godi'r hen wlad yn ei hôl (1989), 246-50;
- also Hel Achau, 34(1991).
- Information from his daughter.
Author:
Thomas Gwynn Jones (1904-90), Swansea
