Spring 2014

Newsletter Welcome to the Spring issue of the Gwent Archives newsletter. Story Boxes

As part of the Explore Your Archive campaign launched in November we have created five different story boxes with tales about people from the past from around the County. These boxes contain the story and accompanying facsimiles of our documents to demonstrate the type of information that can be found by anyone at Gwent Archives. The stories are as follows: Inside this issue Blaenau-Gwent: A story about William Roderick, a shoemaker from who fell on hard-times, suffered from mental-illness and was firstly admitted to the workhouse then Pen-y-fal asylum where he Welcome and news...... 1 eventually died. Document of the Quarter .. 2 Caerphilly: A story about Charles Davies from Bargoed who had a wife and young child and was implicat- Life of an archivist ...... 3 ed in the theft of some caps from a train, and subsequently convicted and imprisoned in the County Gaol at Usk. Article: News from Sicily .... 4

Monmouthshire: A story about the Reverend William Davies Jones of Llanellen and his scandalous life in A Recent Acquisition ...... 5 the village during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, during which time he was involved in A New Accession ...... 6 a high profile separation from his wife, prosecuted for having his dog loose and persecuted by his parish- ioners.

Newport: A story about international Newport, the development of and the consequent settlement of different nationalities in the area, focussing on Scandinavians living in . Torfaen: A story about the Llanerch colliery disaster of 1890 that killed 176 people, devas- tating the community in and around the Abersychan area including Elizabeth Pritchard of Club

The story boxes can be viewed at Gwent Archives and in these venues around the County:

Market Hall Cinema, Brynmawr Brynmawr and District Museum Salem Chapel and Chartist Exhibition Centre, Blaina Bedwellty House, Tredegar The Miners' Institute, Blackwood Maes Manor Country Hotel, Blackwood Cwmcarn Forest Visitors' Centre Crumlin Institute The Memo', Newbridge Caldicot Library Risca Library One Stop Shop, Abergavenny Civic Centre, Pontypool Pontypool Active Living Centre Greenmeadow Community Farm, Cwmbran Llanyrafon Manor, Cwmbran The Iron Works, Blaenavon Goytre Wharf Congress , Cwmbran Shire Hall, Monmouth Pontypool Library Chepstow Castle Cwmbran Library Secret Garden, Little Mill The Regimental Museum, Monmouth Blaenavon Library Newport Library Gilwern Library The Roman Baths, Library Abergavenny Library Bulwark Community Centre, Chepstow , Newport

Page 1 Archives Hub At Gwent Archives we are working to upload its catalogues on to Ar- to create access to our catalogues chives Hub and as this continues it is NEW! online. As well as increasing the hoped that our collection will be Library Catalogue numbers of catalogues we have on opened up to more research and our website, we have also recently exploration. We now have a catalogue cover- joined forces with the Archives Hub so that the scope of our collection ing all our non-archival book Gwent Archives will have a stall at the can be realised. Archives Hub, based holdings that are situated in the at Mimas, University of Manchester, Local History Day @ Newport Refer- research room and library. Our provides an online gateway to ar- ence Library, 15th March, 10am-3pm. library also incorporates the chival repositories throughout the Geoff Mein collection of books. country. It currently represents Come and find out more about the The catalogue is available as a around 220 archive services and hard copy in the research room provides an invaluable catalogue of Archives and the information that we and online on our website. the archives held within these repos- hold. itories. Gwent Archives has started

Document of the Quarter: Order for the punishment of a rogue and vagabond (D749/78).

Transcription: ‘Usk Borough in the County of Monmouth: To the Constable of the said Borough.

For as much as a rogue and vaga- bond was this day found wander- ing and begging within the said Borough and was thereupon ap- prehended and is now brought before me Philip Jones Esq. Portreeve of the said Borough that he may be punished dealt withal according to Law these are therefore to command you to strip or cause to be stripped the said … naked from the middle upwards and publickely to whip or cause him to be whipped till his body be bloody. Given under my hand and seal within the Borough aforesaid in the said County the 16th day of …’ n.d. (18thC?)

A fear of the ‘masterless man’ led to the severe punishment of vagrants during the Tudor period with whipping, branding, enslavement, and even execution meted out as a deterrent to people who refused to conform to normal societal rules by wandering and begging.* Whipping and imprisonment were still used in the eighteenth century to discourage vagrancy, however, it is not clear how often these punishments were carried out.* The document shown appears not to have been used as there is no offender named (D749/78). An alternative to physical punishment was to remove the vagrant to their parish of origin, therefore passing the responsibility and financial upkeep of the destitute to someone else.

*Rogers, N. ‘Policing the poor in eighteenth-century London: The vagrancy laws and their administration’ on http:// pi.library.yorku.ca/ojs/index.php/hssh/article/viewFile/ 16452/15311

2 Life of an Archivist

When researchers visit the Archives, often all that is seen are the front of house activities in the Research Room. I’d like to give customers an insight into the tasks archivists are required to perform at Gwent Archives. These tasks are rotated between archivists on a weekly basis:

Duty archivist: The duty archivist invigilates in the Research Room and en- sures that everything such as pre-ordered documents, the till and computers are ready for service in the morning. In the Research Room the archivist works alongside two assistants and together we register and sign in research- ers, advise them of which archival documents may assist with their enquiries, retrieve documents for them and show them how to handle the documents. We also take decisions on what can be copied, as well as reproducing copies from originals. In the evening the Duty Archivist is responsible for closing eve- rything down, locking up and ensuring that the alarm has been set.

Reserve archivist: The main task of the reserve archivist is to answer tele- phone, email and postal enquiries. This can be a mixture of informing people of the relevant records we hold, carrying out paid research, or advising who to contact if the pertinent records are not held by us. We receive multifarious enquiries including: family, local and house history requests. The Reserve Ar- chivist will also cover the Research Room when the Duty Archivist is una- Strongroom 1 at Gwent Archives: secure and climate vailable. controlled storage for our unique collections.

Accessioning archivist: The main responsibility of the accessioning archivist is to accept new accessions and negotiate with potential depositors. When we are looking to take in new accessions, we assess whether the records are relevant to Gwent Archives (sometimes it is more appropriate for another Archive to take them). If we decide that we are going to take them, we then work out the terms and conditions (e.g. are the records being loaned or given to the Archives), and our Conservator checks the condition of the records before they are stored.

Cataloguing archivist: All the archivists have designated collections to work on. We sort, clean and package these records, give them indi- vidual reference numbers, and provide them with a permanent loca- tion in our Strongrooms. Catalogues are then produced so that mem- bers of the public can use the records.

Project archivist: Each archivist has been given a project to sort out at the archives: e.g. drawing up policies, keeping an active volunteers programme running, setting up databases, etc. The projects are usual- ly ways in which we are looking to improve the service.

In addition to the roles outlined above, the archivists are also called on to give talks, take tour groups round and sometimes run evening classes for the UHOVI Researching Family History course. An archi- vist’s life is full of variety and interest, we get to meet and communi- cate with people from all over the globe, and also have access to fas- cinating unique archival documents.

Now, that’s the life!

Strongroom 2 at Gwent Archives: Different types and size of shelving to accommodate a variety of documents. 3 News From Sicily…1693

The ‘Newport’ Collection, catalogue number D43, is a miscellanea of strophic events of 1693. In addition to the terrible human cost, the documents held at Gwent Archives. It consists of some 7,425 deeds, region also suffered significant historic and cultural losses as the papers and volumes which range in date from the Late Medieval masonry and timberwork, paint and plaster of castles, churches, Period to the middle of the Twentieth Century. The collection con- ancient public buildings and monuments disappeared almost over- sists of documents once held at solicitors’ offices, family and estate night in the violence of the quakes and tsunami. Sicily was in ruin. papers and single items received from private depositors. The vast The rebuilding programme that followed the cataclysm would be majority of documents contain information pertaining to the owner- extensive with major urban areas in the Val di Noto region, Catania, ship of various parish lands and property holdings in the form of Modica, Palazzolo, Ragusa and Scicli eventually emerging from the rentals, agreements, maps, plans, inventories, leases and surveys rubble of 1693 to become iconic examples of the Sicilian Baroque, a and are very useful for those interested in the socioeconomic histo- term used specifically to describe the architectural style employed ry of parishes. However, two documents discov- on the buildings designed and rebuilt after 1693 in south-eastern ered in 2013 whilst re-packaging and boxing the D43 collection have Sicily. shed light on an historic event that affected people and properties The following letter D43/7184 was sent from Sicily and is dated 20 well beyond the parochial spheres of Monmouthshire January 1693, just nine days after the second and more destructive The documents in question include a letter written from Sicily dated earthquake. An excerpt has been transcribed and is attached be- 20 January 1693 and a list, also from Sicily, dated 1 February 1693, low. The identity of the author and first hand witness to the tragic the subject matter of both documents being the cataclysmic earth- events is a mystery but its recipient was almost certainly John Mor- quakes that struck Sicily on 9 January and 11 January 1693 and their gan, a member of the wealthy Morgan family of Machen. In 1656, aftermath. These earthquakes and the tsunami that followed them aged 15, John was apprenticed to Edward Hopegood a London mer- devastated huge swathes of south-eastern Sicily bringing chaos, chant. He later went on to become a successful and very wealthy destruction and death to an area measuring approximately 14,000 merchant in his own right and attained the ranks of High Sheriff of square kilometres. Around 70 cities, towns and villages were se- Monmouthshire in 1697, custos rotulorum for Monmouthshire in verely damaged or completely destroyed and the overall death toll 1700 and Lord Lieutenant of Brecknockshire and Monmouthshire in is estimated to have been between 53,000 and 93,000. In the Val di 1715. Noto region nearly fifty urban centres were destroyed, partially or entirely. In Catania, one of the major towns in that area, almost two thirds of the population were wiped out. Vincentius Bonajutus, a contemporary witness to the Sicilian disaster writing in 1694 ob- served that:

‘So horrid and amazing a shake was at once over all Sicily, of which it left, if not destroyed, yet at least every part miserably shaken. Its impulse was so vehement and powerful, that not only many Cities and Countries of the Kingdom of Naples, but the Island of Malta participated also of its fury. It was in this Country impossible to keep upon our Legs, or in one place on the dancing Earth; nay, those that lay along on the Ground, were tossed from side to side, as if on a rolling Billow.’

The more severe earthquake of 11 January 1693 is estimated by modern seismologists to have reached a magnitude of 7.4 on the Moment Magnitude scale with a maximum intensity of XI (extreme) on the Mercalli Intensity scale, making it one of the most powerful in Italian history and documents held at the Archivo General de Simancas contain references to numerous aftershocks that struck the area periodically until at least 1696, some of which appear to have been almost as powerful as those experienced during the cata-

Bonajutus, V. and Malpighius, M. 2014. ‘An Account of the Earthquakes in Sicilia, on the Ninth and Eleventh of January, 1692/3 Translated from an Italian Letter Wrote from Sicily by the Noble Vincentius Bonajutus, and Communicated to the Royal Society by the Learned Marcellus Malpighius, Physician to His Present Holiness’, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society 18, 1694, pp. 2-10. *WWW+. http://rstl.royalsocietypublishing.org/subscriptions *Accessed 13 February 2014+

4 Transcription: Hon: S*i+r

I advised you last post of the terrible earthquakes we had here, since w*hi+ch we have had the bad news of in c*irc+a 40 cittys and villages that are quite destroyed w*i+th the death of near 130000 soules. I went to Catt*ani+a to see if I could help any of our friends to recover their goods, but when I arrived there I found not one stone on the other and of 20000 inhabitants there is but in c*irc+a 1000 alive, part of w*hi+ch want a leg or an arme it was so dreadfull a sight that I cannot express it; at foot hereof you have a list of our customers who is dead and who alive, and it is a great wonder there should be so many of them saved considering that of twenty thousand there is but one saved. Do and di Antonio will have a vast loss he having great credit. In most of these places that are destroyed all w*hi+ch will be lost, so it is well we had nothing to do w*i+th him, this is the utter ruin of Sicily, for that part that is destroyed is the only fruitfull part of the island and consumd most part of our woollen goods _ The author of the letter provides quite detailed observations on the devastation and harrowing post-quake conditions in the region. At the foot of the letter is a list of urban areas affected by the tragedy, whilst on the back is a list of dead and missing local business associ- ates. Nevertheless, the author’s lamentations do not appear to have been entirely impelled by the human cost. Essentially, the letter is a correspondence between seventeenth-century business men with obvious financial interests in the region and at some points the overall emphasis placed upon loss of custom, profit and commodities is somewhat unsettling, particularly when one considers the con- text in which the letter was composed.

Gareth Thomas, Archive Assistant, Gwent Archives.

‘It was so dreadful a sight that I cannot express it.’ (News from Sicily)

A Recent Acquisition Among the records recently donated to Gwent Archives is a photographic portrait of a local clergyman. Daniel George Davies was born in 1842 at Llangaddock in Carmar- thenshire where his father Thomas was the vicar. He gained an M.A. at Jesus College, Oxford, and was ordained in 1865. Daniel spent much of his life in Monmouthshire, being vicar at Dixton and later rector of Shirenewton. He was also Honorary Chaplain of the 6th Monmouthshire Rifle Volunteer Corps in 1872.

Interestingly, his last position was at the English church at Lausanne in Switzerland, where he died in 1912. Of his twelve children, George Sevier Davies, who also attend- ed Oxford, became a C of E clergyman, and in 1911 was living in Eton with his brother James Ford who was a hydraulic engineer who appears to have been on a visit from America. Unfortunately another son, Francis Hugh, born in Dixton Vicarage, and a Lieutenant in the Dorsetshire Regiment, lost his life in the Great War in Flanders in 1917.

The photograph is undated but appears to have been taken when the subject was in middle-age. An inscription in the corner reads, “Artistic Photographic Co. Ltd, 63, Baker Street, 17.” This address in London was later (in 1922) acquired by the well- known firm of photographers, Elliott and Fry. 5 A New Accession: Trevethin Comprehensive School (The Pontypool County School for Girls).

A new accession has been catalogued and is now available to the public. Under the heading of Trevethin Comprehensive School, the public will be able search the records of not one but three schools. This is because the site on which Trevethin Comprehensive school was located until it closed in 2007, has been a place for educating children since 1897.

The 1889 Welsh Intermediate Education Act paved the way for the establishment of a school in Pontypool. The former South Baptist College, was purchased in 1894 by the newly created Board of Governors for £1,250. With a gift of neighbouring land from the Hanbury family, Governors’ donations and £100 from the Pontypool chambers of commerce, the building was extended and refurbished at a cost of £1297 and the Pontypool County School for Girls opened on 13th January 1897 with 43 pupils. The school gained a reputation for excel- lence, and by the time of its jubilee year of 1947, it had ten times the number. The school was eventually merged with Trevethin Secondary School in 1982.

The collection includes School logbooks, Pupil admissions registers, School trips to Germany and Bologne, the school magazine called ‘The Dragon’ as well as numerous photographs of school activities and sports. The visitor’s book records visits by public figures of the day, such as Violet Attlee, the wife of the Labour Prime Minister and Olave Baden-Powell the wife of the famous scout-master.

If you were educated at the Pontypool County School for Girls or Trevethin Comprehensive or, you know a relative who was, then come and visit us at Gwent Archives and see if you can find a mention or a photograph of them.

Forthcoming Events Chartist Trails to Trials: Look out for ‘Taster Days’ for the Chartist Trails to Trials Project organised by Gwent Archives. Taking place in May, June and July these guided tours of Chartist locations are led by heritage experts and are followed by a practical document session. A free buffet lunch (and transport where appropriate) will be included. Dates to be announced. Please contact Rhiannon Phillips at [email protected] for further details.

Community Heritage Courses: Starting on Wednesday 5th March (10am – 12pm & 6.30pm – 8.30pm), at Brynmawr Learning Action Centre, “Community Heritage” aims to help you research local stories, to locate evidence and artefacts, to bring them to life and to explore ways in which stories can be told. Part of UHOVI’s Bite-Size Learning, the course includes lectures, discussions, practical sessions and visits to local archives, museums and heritage centres. Runs until May 2014. For more information please visit: http://www.uhovi.ac.uk/bite-size-learning.aspx

Introductory Talk about Gwent Archives: Blackwood Library, 2 April, 2pm-3pm.

A Guide to World War One Sources at Gwent Archives: Talks on 7th and 12th April, times and talks to be confirmed. To register your interest in these events, please contact us on 01495 353363.

A Reminiscence Walk in Ebbw Vale: 12th April, 10am – 12pm: Using maps and photographs, our staff will show you how the town centre and surrounding area has changed. To register your interest in this event, please contact us on 01495 353363.

Your Place in History: Day-schools exploring Chartism in Tredegar (18th May) and Nantyglo and Blaina (21st May). In the morning you will be led on a historical tour around the town, followed by a session at Gwent Archives looking at Chartist documents for the history of the town. An opportunity to find out about Chartism in your area and the ‘Trails to Trials Project’. To register your interest in these events, please contact us on 01495 353363.

Gwent Archives Steelworks Road http://gwentarchives.gov.uk [email protected] Ebbw Vale https://www.facebook.com/pages/Gwent-Archives/213357272143301 NP23 6DN https://twitter.com/GwentArchives

YOUR LOGO HERE

Page 6