Cromwell in Baglan:
 

The Royalist forces fleeing the battlefield at St Fagan’s  headed West to Tenby and Pembroke Castle and were followed in hot pursuit by the Parliamentary Army. Cromwell arrived at Chepstow on May 10th and at Cardiff on May 16th. Travelling through the Vale of Glamorgan he reached the fishing Port of Aberafan . While there, Cromwell decided to take away the Town Charter but was unable to find it as it had been hidden in the hollow of a chopping block.
 

After leaving Aberafan, Cromwell would have travelled on the Roman Road through Baglan to Briton Ferry and the River Neath, it is possible but unlikely that Cromwell and his army crossed the rover at this point, the reason being the river at low tide is very treacherous. Avoiding the whirlpools and quick-sands, Cromwell with a few body guards could have crossed the river by boat and travelled to Swansea over the Crumlyn Burrows and the rest of his army marching around Neath. However it is more plausible that Cromwell may have rested at Briton Ferry House (later Vernon House), which was the home of Bussy Mansel, Cromwell’s Commander in Chief in Glamorgan.

(When the Sunnycroft Roundabout was being constructed at Baglan a Cromwellian pike head was discovered in a nearby stream. Could the Roundheads have rested and watered their men and horses here).

The Cromwellian visit seems to co-incide with the alleged disappearance of St Baglan's brass crozier but there does not seem to be any prrof.

 

Other sources:

Eben Jones from Wells Rd wrote 2 books on Baglan around 1988