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According to the tradition of the country, he was the illegitimate
son of Sir John Wynn of Gwedir, by one Catherine Jones of Tregaron,
and was born at a place called Fynnon Lidiart, close by Tregaron,
towards the conclusion of the sixteenth century. He was baptised
by the name of Thomas Jones, but was generally called Tom Shone
Catti, that is Tom Jones, son of Catti or Catherine. His mother,
who was a person of some little education, brought him up, and
taught him to read and write. His life, till his eighteenth year,
was much like other peasant boys; he kept crows, drove bullocks,
and learned to plough and harrow, but always showed a disposition
to roguery and mischief. Between eighteen and nineteen, in order
to free himself and his mother from poverty which they had long
endured, he adopted the profession of a thief, and soon became
celebrated through the whole of Wales for the cleverness and
adroitness which he exercised in his calling; qualities in which he
appears to have trusted much more than in strength and daring,
though well endowed with both. His disguises were innumerable, and
all impenetrable; sometimes he would appear as an ancient crone;
sometimes as a begging cripple; sometimes as a broken soldier.
Though by no means scrupulous as to what he stole, he was
particularly addicted to horse and cattle stealing, and was no less
successful in altering the appearance of animals than his own, as
he would frequently sell cattle to the very persons from whom he
had stolen them, after they had been subjected to such a
metamorphosis, by means of dyes and the scissors, that recognition
was quite impossible.
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