chs07450 Dr Evan Davis of Rhoscelyn Eastgate.docx

Dr. Evan Thomas Davis and Lougher family

Mervyn Lougher Goodey came with wife Connie, from his home in British Columbia, to pursue his family history research in and around . He provided the following information :

His great grandfather was Dr. Evan Thomas Davis, originating from Ebbw Vale, who features in the 1881 census at ‘Rhoscelyn’, 36 Eastgate. He was described then as a doctor of medicine, surgeon & physician, and was living there with his three year old daughter Eveline Lougher Davis (Mervyn’s grandmother), who had been born in Cowbridge.

Evan Davis’s wife Margaret and their second child, Laura Lougher Davis, were staying in when the 1881 census was taken. They were visiting Margaret’s recently widowed father, Daniel Lougher, a retired miller in Canton. His wife had also been Margaret (Margaret Lloyd, 1811-1881, daughter of Edward Lloyd of Green Farm, ). She and Daniel (son of Richard Lougher, farmer at New Wallace, Wenvoe) had been married in Llanmihangel church in 1841.

Evan Thomas Davis was initially a ‘puddler’ in the steelworks of Ebbw Vale, but was deeply involved in the Methodist/Congregationalist religion and probably came south to the Vale of because of this. Through his religion, he met up with Dr Richard Lougher of Canton, Cardiff, and was persuaded by him to take up a career in medicine. He worked his way through medical school in Glasgow, and on qualifying he married Richard’s sister, Margaret Lougher. He started a medical practice in Cowbridge in July 1876, and after the birth of the first daughter, Eveline, on November 15th 1877, had ‘Rhoscelyn’ built (it was probably actually built by William Aaron James) for the family home. The second daughter, Laura, was born there in 1879, and from there Evan Davis conducted his medical practice.

Evan Davis, described as a medical doctor, features in some of the Cowbridge directories in the 1890s, but according to his diary, he found difficulty in attracting patients to his practice (perhaps because of his religion, and perhaps because there were too many other medics in the town), so by the 1891 census he had moved with his family to Cardiff. Cardiff was booming at this time. Evan had a house built at 160 Richmond Road, and then another next door (no. 162) which he rented out. He was there in Cardiff in the censuses of 1891 and 1911. He held his money in the Bank of , which declared bankruptcy, and so he resumed his medical profession in order to boost his income.

Richard Lougher, Margaret’s brother, and also her older brother, Daniel Lloyd Lougher, were living all this time in Canton, Cardiff where Richard was a doctor. Surprisingly, Margaret and her parents, and also Evan Thomas Davis, are all buried in church, despite this being a Church in Wales.

Eveline Davis, Evan and Margaret’s daughter and Mervyn’s grandmother, was well educated, and for a time she taught physics and chemistry to adults in Bristol. In about 1908, she married Albert Gladstone Goodey in Cardiff. He had been born in Colchester, Essex and was also a staunch Methodist. He went on to practice as a dentist in Halstead, Essex. They had one child, a boy named Wilfrid (Mervyn’s father) – Eveline believed there were ‘too many people in the world’ to have more children. She called herself ‘Eveline Lougher Goodey’, and then by deed poll had her son Wilfrid legally named ‘Wilfrid Davis Lougher-Goodey’.

chs07450 Dr Evan Davis of Rhoscelyn Eastgate.docx

Wilfrid Lougher-Goodey moved to live in Ireland from Colchester in 1944. He was an architect/town planner and worked for Northern Ireland county council. He realised he had no chance of promotion there, however, and moved with his family in 1954 to Canada (Victoria B.C.).

Betty Alden, May 2019