Dr. Thomas Dyke Plaque sited on the fence of the disabled car park at Swan Street, Merthyr Tydfil
Thomas Dyke (1816-1900) was born in Merthyr and played an active part in its public life for the greater part of a century. Trained at Guys and St. Thomas’s hospitals he was parish surgeon for various Merthyr districts and for the Dowlais Iron Company.
He was appointed Merthyr’s Medical Officer of Health in 1865.
The improvements in water supply, sewerage, sanitation, inspection, and housing, most of them under his guidance, meant that by the end of the century Merthyr’s average death rate was less than the average for other industrial centres and the death rate from infantile diarrhoea for most of 1865-1900 was the lowest of any town in the United Kingdom.
Dyke was also a prominent Freemason, a founder of the Merthyr subscription library and a keen advocate of town incorporation.
We continue our serialisation of the memories of Merthyr in the 1830’s by an un-named correspondent to the Merthyr Express, courtesy of Michael Donovan.
From the work room of Mr Wm James, not only was there no storage or openings on that side of the High Street, but with the exception of three small shops adjoining the one on the corner of Glebeland Street, there was not a building of any kind.
The nearest i.e., the one first come to on the way up was the shop of a hairdresser named Davies. If I remember rightly, Bears Grease was considered the best one used on the human hair, and this Davies, upon one opening, had a bear hung up outside his shop, after the manner of butchers hanging calves brains was afterwards to be had, but whether the result of his enterprise was advantageous I know not.
An 1839 advertisement for Bear’s Grease
Either in the next, or following shop above, a Mr McGregor sold garden seeds, and the corner shop belonged to Mr Edward Morgan, grocer, who had a wholesale trade too. Mr Morgan resided on the other side of the High Street. He was connected by marriage, I think, with the Jones’s and Evans’s of the Bank.
The Post Office was on the corner of Glebeland Street and High Street, on the same site as at present, but before describing it, or going further up we will return to Gillar Street and come up on the right hand side of High Street.
First there was a grocer’s shop, and then the Crown Inn – a Mrs Richards was the landlady. Above this was the druggist’s shop kept by Mrs Jenkins, the mother of the late Dr T J Dyke. She also had two sons of the name of Jenkins. John, a clergy-man, who went to Natal, was Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford, a canon of the Church, and became vicar of Aberdare. He was the most charitable of men, but the most absent-minded as a boy. Upon asking what he intended being, his reply, in all earnestness, was “the Bishop of Merthyr”. His brother James became a Roman Catholic priest, but did not live many years.
An advert from 1835 mentioning Mrs Jenkins’ Druggist shop
Next above was a draper’s shop. Mr John James kept it, and made money enough to go into the wholesale trade in Manchester, but returned in a few years to Merthyr, and built a large premises opposite which is Victoria Street and called the Cloth Hall.
There was a yard with wooden doors, and on the other side a grocer’s shop was kept by Mr Christopher James. Upon Mr James’s removal this business went into the hands of Mr John Jones, who had been with Mr James for some time. Mr James himself the for a while carried on a wine and spirit business near the Bush Hotel, but only for a short time, as he removed to Swansea, and went into the coal trade.
This Mr Christopher James was a brother of the Mr William James already alluded to, and another brother was Mr Job James, a doctor living in Pontmorlais, one of whose sons, Mr Frank James, was for so many years clerk to the Merthyr Union. Mr Christopher James has several sons. Vice-Chancellor William Milbourne James was, I think, the oldest (see http://www.merthyr-history.com/?p=3084). Another was Mr David James, a tanner living on the side of the tramroad in Bethesda Street or Pontstorehouse.
Another son, Christopher, was in the shop with his father, and upon giving up a building on the canal bank which had been used as a storehouse for flour etc., 60 guineas were found hidden there, reputed to have belonged to him. Another son was the harbour master of Swansea 40 years ago, and his son succeeded him in that capacity for a short time. One of this Mr James’s daughters married a Mr Brock, the minister of the Unitarian Chapel in Swansea, and another Mr Joseph Henry Rowland, of the bank in Neath.
I suppose it’s difficult for us to imagine what life would be like without a hospital in an hour of need, but before 1888 Merthyr had only a small six-bedded Cottage Hospital for children at Bridge Street.
There was the workhouse for the sick paupers and Mrs Clark’s Hospital at Dowlais which had closed six years earlier. There was also a Fever Hospital at Pant, built in 1869, and another at Tydfil’s Well. These were totally inadequate for the needs of a town the size of Merthyr, with the many accidents that occurred at the Ironworks and collieries. When accidents did occur the doctors would have to perform operations on a kitchen table or at the doctor’s surgery.
The Voluntary Hospital had for some time existed in London and other large cities. These were maintained by gifts and bequests from individuals and groups. The patients did not have to pay for treatment, for the doctors gave of their skills freely and in doing so gained a great deal of prestige and power in the management of the hospital.
By February 1886 the caring people associated with the Cottage Hospital formed a group with the sole aim of improving the facilities in Merthyr for the sick and injured. They included Drs. Biddle, Cresswell, Webster, Ward and Dr Dyke who had founded the Children’s Hospital at his home called ‘The Hollies’ in Bridge Street, Merthyr with the Rev J Griffiths the then Rector of Merthyr and Sir W T Lewis, who later became Lord Merthyr.
Unknown Dr, Dr Biddle, Dr Cresswell & Dr Ward
It was through Sir W. T. Lewis that the Marquis of Bute offered the sum of £1,000 towards the building of a voluntary hospital at Merthyr, and £1,000 towards the upkeep, provided the people of Merthyr raised the remainder of the money for the building. A meeting was held at the Temperance Hall and the people of Merthyr responded by raising £5,220 – a very large sum of money in those days.
The Clock field was chosen as a suitable site between Dowlais and Merthyr because Dowlais was equally as important as Merthyr at that time. It was opposite the Old Penydarren Works and the freehold cost £300. The foundation stone was laid by Sir W T Lewis in June 1887. Lewis was greatly involved with the hospital and had donated ‘35,000 pennies’ which he had received from the members of the Provident Society, which he had helped found, on the occasion of his knighthood.
The General Hospital in 1888
The new hospital had two ten-bedded wards. The first, The Lady Ann Lewis Ward, was named after Sir W T Lewis’ wife, who was the grand-daughter of Robert and Lucy Thomas the first exporters of steam coal in South Wales. The second ward was St Luke’s Ward. There was also a small four bedded ward for children, which was the room used as the operating theatre opposite Ann Lewis Ward for many years. The original theatre had been opposite St Luke’s Ward, in what later became the General Office. Next to the original theatre were the splint and instrument rooms and the Dispensary.
Ann Lewis WardSt Luke’s Ward
The Hospital had a Board of Governors and they were the policy making body. Anyone could be a governor for the sum of £2 per year. Thousands of people helped to maintain the hospital voluntarily. The workers at the Ironworks and Collieries were asked to contribute a farthing a week or a penny per month or one shilling per year towards the cost. It seems a very small amount to us now, but not in 1888. Any donation above £100 was recorded for all to see on a large board at the entrance hall.
Many people endowed beds in memory of loved ones and would maintain the endowment over 12 months. When the hospital opened, it required £500 per year to cover expenses; by 1940 – £6,000 and by 1950 – £52,000, but wages were blamed for the last increase.
In 1895, as part of Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee Celebration, an Accident Receiving Ward was endowed by Sir W T Lewis. A stained glass window was commissioned by the High Constable of Merthyr, Mr Frank James, a solicitor and clerk to the Board of Guardians, to honour Lewis’ gesture. On 4 April 1900 a statue of Sir W T Lewis was erected outside the hospital in recognition of these services and the honour conferred upon him by Queen Victoria, in raising him to the Baronetcy.
The General Hospital after the opening of the Accident Receiving Ward – built adjoining the hospital at the left of the picture
Following on (obliquely) from the last post, and although it is a morbid subject, it is also fascinating to see what were the main causes of death in years gone by. Here is an extract from the Annual Report for the Sanitary Condition of Merthyr Tydfil from 1868 – 150 years ago.
Today marks the anniversary of the death of another very important in Merthyr’s History – Dr T J Dyke.
Dr T J Dyke
Thomas Jones Dyke was born in Lower High Street in Merthyr on 16 September 1816.* His father, Thomas Dyke, a pharmaceutical chemist, had moved to Merthyr from Bristol in the early 1800’s and set up a business in the town, first in partnership with D S Davies and then on his own at a premises at Court Street.
Thomas Dyke Jr. attended the schools of William Shaw in Gellifaelog, Taliesin Williams in Bridge Street and William Armsworth in Swansea, before finishing his education at the Bedminster House Academy in Bristol. In 1831 he began a three year apprenticeship with Mr David Davies, the surgeon at the Cyfarthfa Works, before going to London in 1834 to further his medical studies. He attended Granger’s School of Anatomy and Medicine and also Guys and St Thomas’ Hospitals, and passed as an apothecary in 1837 and as a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons the following year.
Returning to Merthyr, the now Dr Dyke set up practice, and in 1842 bought ‘The Hollies’, a cottage in Albert Street where he lived until 1894.
During the cholera epidemic of 1849 (see previous blog entry http://www.merthyr-history.com/?p=123), Dr Dyke was appointed Medical Officer of Health of one of the districts into which Merthyr had been divided due to the epidemic. Dr Dyke actually contracted cholera himself, but after battling the disease for six weeks, he eventually pulled through. Cholera hit Merthyr again in 1854 and 1866, and Dr Dyke was at the forefront of the fight against the disease.
In 1863, Dr Dyke was appointed as the first permanent Medical Officer of Health to the Merthyr Tydfil Board of Health, a position he retained until his death, the Board of Health being replaced by the Merthyr Tydfil Urban Council in 1894.
In 1876 the Hospital for Sick Children was founded in Bridge Street, and Dr Dyke was put in charge of the medical care there. The Hospital for Sick Children would grow and eventually become the General Hospital in 1888.
Dr Dyke’s services were recognised when he was appointed High Constable of Caerphilly Higher (which covered Merthyr at the time) in 1876 and 1877; and in 1886 he was appointed as a Justice of the Peace of Glamorganshire.
The above facts do not give justice to the immense service he provided to Merthyr. Throughout his life Dr Dyke fought to improve medical and sanitary conditions in the town, and as Medical Officer to the Board of Health, he used his influence to facilitate many of these improvements. Through the auspices of the Board of Health, Merthyr received a reliable and clean water supply in 1861, and between 1865 and 1868 a system of new sewers was built in the town leading to a new sewage farm ensuring that very little sewage was deposited directly into the River Taff.
Thomas Dyke died peacefully in his sleep on 20 January 1900. In his obituary in the South Wales Daily News on 22 January 1990 was written:
“He was closely identified with Merthyr and all its works for the greater part of a century. The public came to recognise him as one who did something to the benefit of the community at large. No man did better life saving work in South Wales”.
*ADDENDUM
I have received an e-mail from Roger Evans with the following information:
Your page on Thomas Jones Dyke (a man I greatly admire), states he was born in Lower High Street in Merthyr on 16 September 1816.
Many sources quote 1816 as his year of birth which I believe may have originated in Charles Wilkins ‘History of Merthyr Tydfil’ 1908. The year may have been estimated from Census records which record a person’s a age rather than year of birth.
The National Archive however definitely, shows he was born on 22 July 1815 and then baptised 13 August 1815, in the presence of his parents Thomas and Maria. (Record number 216; TNA/RG4/4090).
I attach the original record and a clear transcript both obtained from the National Archive.
Regards Roger Evans
Record number 216; TNA/RG4/4090
Thank you to Roger Evans for pointing this out. I do appreciate it as it really matters that all the facts are correct.
When looking at Merthyr’s history, it is sometimes easy to forget the crippling poverty that afflicted a lot of people in the town. Below is an article that appeared in the Merthyr Telegraph 139 years ago today about a group of local dignitaries who tried to alleviate the situation….
Thomas Dyke (1816-1900) was born in Merthyr and played an active part in its public life for the greater part of a century. Trained at Guys and St. Thomas’s hospitals he was parish surgeon for various Merthyr districts and for the Dowlais Iron Company.
