In April 1646 Charles surrendered himself to the Scottish army, and the First Civil War came to an end. Harlech was still holding out, and it was only in March 1647, just a year after the surrender of Chester, and seven months after Raglan, the last English fortress to fly the Royal standard, had capitulated, that it opened its gates to Mytton. The year 1647 was occupied in fruitless negotiations between King and Parliament, and in bitter controversy and recrimination between Parliament and Army, Presbyterians and Independents. {187} So divided had the Roundheads become that Charles again took heart, and in 1648 embarked upon the adventure which was to cost him his life--the so-called Second Civil War. Nowhere had the new religious and political controversies raged with greater rancour than in Wales. The supremacy of the Army, and the triumph of the Independents, were contemplated with unconcealed aversion and dismay. Even men like Laugharne, who had been prominent in the war against Charles, now went over to his side. On February 20, Colonel Poyer, Governor of Pembroke Castle, refused to lay down his command in favour of a successor who had been appointed to take his place. Other bodies of troops joined Poyer, who drove the Parliamentary army out of Pembroke. This was the signal for a general revolt throughout Wales. One-half of the Model Army, under the command of Horton, was sent in hot haste to the Principality; and in May it defeated Laugharne and his rebels at St. Fagan's. Before the end of the month Cromwell himself appeared on the scene. The rebels were chased from the open country, and shut up in the castles of Pembroke, Tenby, and Chepstow. The two {188} latter places were taken without much difficulty, but Pembroke, where Poyer himself commanded, held out until July. Its gallant commander was put to death, to expiate the offence of apostasy, an offence rendered exceptionally heinous by the fact that--to quote the words written by Cromwell at the time--it had been committed "against so much light." Meanwhile events had been moving quickly in North Wales as well. Byron, with the assistance of Colonel Robinson, had gained possession of Anglesey; but the central figure of the rising in North Wales was the celebrated Sir John Owen of Clenenau. He was a turbulent man, who had done to death the sheriff of Merionethshire with singular brutality. But his undoubted bravery, his bluff manners, and his loyalty made him a popular and a typical figure. Mytton, the successful captor of Harlech, was sent against him, and at the battle of Llandegai Owen was decisively vanquished. With his defeat, and the capture of Pembroke, the Second Civil War in Wales came to a close. Owen had been made prisoner, but through the intercession of Ireton his life was spared.