This five-part BBC series was set in the foothills of the Black Mountains in Carmarthenshire, Wales.
The Peeles of Trewern and the Ellises of Rhos Dirion were bitterly hostile to each other as a result of disputed grazing rights and the feud had split the parish into two factions. On market days and fair days, it was unwise to go about unaccompanied.
Daniel Peele (David Davies) had two sons: Justin the elder (Philip Madoc), wild and dangerous but generous; and Edwin (Emrys James), a more thoughtful boy who was opposed to violence and deeply sensitive to the forbidding beauty of the countryside around him.
John Ellis (Ieuan Rhys Williams) had a son, Jeff (Ray Smith) – bigger and stronger than Justin – and a daughter, Grett (Anne Lloyd), a real beauty, jealously guarded by Jeff from the advances of the neighbourhood’s young bucks.
The tension between the two families reached breaking point when Edwin fell in love with Grett and her with him. The sense of foreboding which pervaded the story steadily increased, so that the final tragedy was inevitable.
Barry Thomas skilfully condensed the novel by Richard Vaughan into five tense and moving episodes.
The serial – which aired on BBC1 in August and September 1965 – was first presented on BBC Wales in 1964.
Daniel Peele
David Davies Mam Peele
Nesta Harris Edwin Peele
Emrys James Grett Ellis
Anne Lloyd Justin Peele
Philip Madoc Iori
Bill Meilen Rhys Blacksmith
John Rees Jeff Ellis
Ray Smith John Ellis
Ieuan Rhys Williams Dai Alltwen
John Dillon Moc
Windsor Davies Teg
Rhoda Lewis Mrs Ellis
Margaret John
Episodes
The Feud | A Day at the Fair | Permission to Marry | Family Conference | The End of the Feud
