by Carolyn Jacob
Following on from the last post here’s a potted history of Caedraw by Carolyn Jacob.
Caedraw means ‘the field beyond’, as it was just outside the traditional village of Merthyr Tydfil and a district beside the River Taff. Although in the eighteenth century it was just a field, as soon as Merthyr started to develop an iron industry this area had houses erected on it for workers and it soon became a built up area. Caedraw first started to have houses from 1800 onwards. Streets here included Taff Street, Upper Taff Street, Picton Street and streets with curious names, such as Isle of Wight and Adam and Eve Court. There was once an old woollen mill in Mill Street. This district was bordered by the River Taff and the Plymouth Feeder.
Along the banks of the river as well as a woollen mill there was a tannery, a laundry, a gas works, together with shops and public houses. The Taff was at its most polluted here, having industrial and household waste, together with the black waters of the Morlais Brook, ‘the Stinky’, carrying the filth of Dowlais and Penydarren Ironworks. Thankfully the herons on its banks find the river much cleaner today.
A hundred years ago Caedraw School was multicultural with English, Irish, Italian, Jewish and Welsh pupils. The old Caedraw School was built in 1872 and had some very famous ex pupils, such as the freeman of Merthyr Tydfil and miner’s leader, Arthur Horner. The school was situated by the old gas works.
Because the district was very near to the river Taff, the first laundry in Merthyr Tydfil was set up here but sadly the workers here succumbed to cholera in the 1849 epidemic and this resulted in the Parish publishing a newspaper advertisement to tell people not to boil their water. According to the 1881 census there was a woollen factory between numbers 37 and 42 Picton Street. There were a number of public houses, lodging houses, and a bakehouse in Vaughan Street.
This built up area consisting of lots of small courtyards was very densely populated. The houses themselves were very clean, but small and without any modern conveniences. The old rambling buildings along tightly packed streets of Caedraw became very old fashioned and in need of repair by the 1950s. Merthyr Tydfil Borough Council decided to redevelop Caedraw and build modern flats here to replace the old houses. From 1959 onwards old Caedraw was gradually pulled down but not without a certain feeling of sadness, despite a headline in the Western Mail on 24 April 1959, ’12 Acres of ugliness being razed, Merthyr’s biggest face lift. More than 200 houses, two shops, two pubs and a club were put under the sledge-hammer in one of the biggest redevelopment schemes in South Wales’.
The official opening of the Caedraw ‘Central Housing Redevelopment Project’ was on Thursday 22 April, 1965 by James Griffiths, Secretary of State for Wales. The Caedraw Scheme of 193 dwellings consisted of 66 one-bedroomed flats in the 12 storey point block. There are 64 two-bedroom maisonettes, 24 three-bedroomed maisonettes and 8 bed-sitting room flats in 8 4-storey blocks. The remainder of the accommodation is contained in two 3-storey blocks containing 19 two-bedroomed maisonettes, 9 one-bedroom flats and 3 bed-sitting room flats. The tender of George Wimpey and Co. Ltd. was accepted by the Council in January 1963 and work on the flats commenced four months later in April. The completion date in the contract was April 1965 but the scheme was completed and handed over six months ahead of this date.
Each block of flats was named after an important figure in the history of Wales. St Tydfil’s Court (the Celtic Saint buried here), Portal House (Portal wrote the report of the Royal Commission of 1935 into the state of Merthyr Tydfil), Wilson Court (Harold Wilson was Labour Prime Minister when the flats were opened), Buckland House (Lord Buckland a wealthy financier born in Merthyr), Attlee House (Clement Attlee Labour Prime Minister after 1945), Hywel House (Hywel Dda was a Welsh King who had the laws of the country written down), Trevithick House (Trevithick was the first to use a locomotive to transport iron from Penydarren and unwillingly carried passengers too).
There are a decreasing number of residents who will remember the ‘old’ Caedraw including Lynn Mittel(Owen Money) who had a family relationship to the Royal Oak pub in Mill Street which, like St.Mary’s Catholic school in Court Street, can be identified in the 1919 map of Caedraw. I was a pupil at the Catholic school until 1957 and was a frequent visitor to that local area until its demolition which began in 1959.The old gas works opposite Caedraw school had been demolished and was a metal scrap yard occupied by the Pippin family guarded by a dog who harassed walkers navigating the old cart bridge spanning the river. All of these features were cleared away by the mid 60’s and the two new schools are seen in the 1965 photo which includes the new footbridge across the river. Finally that footbridge could be accessed via an underpass which was sealed off some years later and today cannot be identified.
I know of all these places in Caedraw because my father lived in Wool street from he was born, until he signed up in September 1939. I heard so many stories of his childhood set in Caedraw- and the old soldiers who frequented the Greyhound pub.
He had a Jewish pal whose mother used to say Oy Vey in exasperation- and my father used that expression all his life.
I think Wool St must have been close to the Mill.
The first time I was old enough to remember visiting Merthyr was 1966- and he took me around all the new streets and buildings -telling me how it used to be. He was glad people had good housing now-but couldn’t help feeling nostalgic for the old place.
I remember seeing the old bridge- it must have been removed soon after.
Thank you for posting this.
Thanks for sharing Wendi
You’re welcome. I actually thought ‘Oy Vey’ was Welsh Language until my teens!☺️
Thank you for a very interesting article.
I lived in cross key st and went to caedraw school when they started to pull.all the streets Down it was like we were chaff in the wind Blowing all over Merthyr some went to Swansea Road some went to the stocks we went to the Gurnos Estate then the Biggest housing Estate in Wales
What an interesting read, I remember the old caedraw although I wasn’t a frequent visitor. The old hollies heath centre was in that area I believe.
Amazing how a place which was so interesting can be converted into a place which isn’t interesting at all.