Tag: The Red Dragon

Work by eminent 19th century Welsh sculptor rediscovered

In 2016 a bust with major Merthyr connections was discovered in Aberystwyth University. Below is the story of the discovery, transcribed with the permission of the University.

A missing marble bust by eminent Welsh sculptor Joseph Edwards (1814-1882) has been rediscovered overlooked in an under-stairs cupboard in the Old College at Aberystwyth University.

The bust, of prolific nineteenth century scholar and historian Thomas Stephens of Merthyr Tydfil (1821-1875), is believed to have reached Aberystwyth along with Stephen’s papers which were donated by his family to the National Library of Wales.

At the time, the National Library of Wales was housed in the Old College.

The bust may have been overlooked when the papers were transferred to the new National Library of Wales building in the late 1930s.

Neil Holland from the School of Art explains: “A great deal of work has taken place since the 1960s to re-catalogue and re-assemble artefacts and collections donated to the University since 1872, and as far as we can recall we have never come across any accession record for the bust of Thomas Stephens in all that time. So it has been hidden away for at least 40 years.”

Joseph Edwards

Joseph Edwards’ love of carving was revealed at an early age. Also from Merthyr Tydfil, and the son of a stone cutter, Edwards left for London in 1835 at the age of 21, after two years apprenticed to a memorial mason in Swansea.

There, after almost succumbing to starvation, he was taken on as a studio assistant by sculptor William Behnes. Two years later, in 1837, Edwards entered the Royal Academy of Arts, where he won several awards for his work.

Numerous commissions followed, and in the ensuing years Edwards created a large number of allegorical works such as The Last Dream, Religion consoling Justice, a monument to Sir Bernard Bosanquet and Religion which was shown at an international exhibition.

In 1838 he was taken on by sculptor Patrick MacDowell, and assisted him in the production of works such as Girl Reading, Triumph of Love and Virginius.

In 1860 Edwards’ began assisting Matthew Noble, and upon Noble’s early death in 1876 Edwards was given responsibility for the considerable task of completing his outstanding commissions and selling original plaster models for the benefit of Noble’s widow and children.

Upon completion of this work Edwards found himself in straitened circumstances and in 1881, sponsored by painter and sculptor George Frederic Watts, Edwards’ was awarded a financial award of £50 per annum under the Turner bequest.  He died shortly after receiving the first instalment.

A year after his death The Red Dragon: The National Magazine of Wales wrote, ‘Of Joseph Edwards it may be said that Wales never had a truer or a more gifted son.’

Edwards was also well known for his portrait busts of contemporary figures and funerary monuments, often memorialising fellow Welshmen.  Examples of his work can be seen in churches and cemeteries throughout Wales and England.

Thomas Stephens

Despite a lack of formal education, Thomas Stephens, an apothecary by profession, became one of Wales’ most innovative scholars, social reformers and cultural critics.  His critical essay on the history of language and literature of medieval Wales, Literature of the Kymry, published in 1849 was met with international acclaim and even appeared in a German translation in 1864.

An important public figure in Merthyr Tydfil, Thomas Stephens led a number of initiatives to improve educational provisions, health and welfare of the town, where living conditions were deplorable and social unrest was prevalent. He co-founded its public library, helped to establish its health board, and advocated state-aided secular education.

Dr Marion Löffler from the University of Wales Centre for Celtic Studies Aberystwyth, who is currently leading a Leverhulme-funded research project focusing on Thomas Stephens, was delighted with the find: “This bust is an important part of Welsh intellectual and art history. Thomas Stephens is one of the best examples of a self-made Welsh Victorian and represents European amateur scholarship at its best.

“The story of the commissioning of the bust speaks volumes itself. When Stephens retired from his post as secretary of Merthyr Library on grounds of severe illness in 1862, a collection was made, but he refused the money. The committee then decided to commission fellow Merthyr man, Joseph Edwards, to create a commemorative artwork.”

In 1878 the Art Journal, the most important Victorian magazine on art, commented on Edwards’ bust of Thomas Stephens: ‘{The Welsh} may well be proud of their countryman, Joseph Edwards.  There are artists who will make as good busts, but there is no living sculptor who can produce monumental work so pure, so refined, so essentially holy.’

To see the original story, please follow the link below.

https://www.aber.ac.uk/en/news/archive/2016/03/title-181749-en.html

The Pioneers of the Welsh Iron Industry

Following on from the recent article about Charles Wilkins, here is a transcription of an article written by him for an issue of his publication ‘The Red Dragon’, which appeared 140 years ago this month.

It is a little over one hundred years ago, in May, 1782, when a messenger came from Wales into the neighbourhood of Stourbridge with great news. One Mr. Bacon had started an ironworks near a village called Merthyr, and he wanted a lot of men. There was a good deal of gossip caused by this. A recruiting sergeant coming into an English village to enlist lads for glory could not have made a greater ferment. Merthyr was “far down in Wales,” and Wales to many seemed as distant as America. “You have to go,” said the messenger, “to Gloucester in a boat, and then trust to the channel and work round as far as Cardiff, and then it is a couple of days’ journey up the mountains.”

There was, I repeat, a good deal of ferment, and no little hesitation, but at last the requisite number of hands was got, and away they went, bidding sorrowful farewells—many of them knowing  it may be for years or it may be forever.” It would not do, they thought, to take their household gods with them, but the pets—Bill’s dog, and Tom’s cat—could not be left behind. The Lees carried between them a wicker cage in which was a shining blackbird. Let us look at them a moment, for they were the pioneers of our old English residents, the Homfrays, Hemuses, Lees, Browns, Turleys, Wilds, Millwards, and they are worthy of more than a passing notice. Powerful men, all of them, trained to labour from youth, and full of hope and of determination. They are going as settlers amongst strange people, who speak a different language, and who may resent the incoming of strangers. Well, let them. The strangers are not only strong, but God-fearing men, and they take sturdily to the boat which tediously carries them down to Worcester.

So tedious was the journey that when Worcester was reached one or two of the men wanted to go back home again, but Homfray, the leader, would not hear of it, and his hand being hard, and his voice strong, they gave in. Gloucester was at length reached, and at that place a barge was hired and down the Severn they went, hugging the coast wherever they could. But somehow or other when night came on the barge drifted out into mid channel, and to their horror on came a storm.

Now everyone wished himself back at the village of Stewpovey, where most of them came from! How fiercely they looked at Homfray, who had led them into this trouble. Presently, however, the storm abated, and they found themselves under Penarth Head, and there was not much difficulty after that in landing at Cardiff. Very small, very insignificant was Cardiff then; a few streets clustering about the Castle, and only a little life there when the boat came once a week from Bristol. At Cardiff, waggons were hired and up the wayfarers toiled through the valley, reaching Merthyr at last.

One of the old pioneers, pipe in mouth and grandson on knee, used in his declining days to tell the wondering listeners his experience of the voyage, and the journey through Merthyr to Cyfarthfa. It was a small place, he said, was Merthyr; just a village like; small houses, fields, and gardens on one side or the other. The houses were thatched, and as the strangers rode by in their waggons their heads were on a level with the eaves. The old inhabitants used to think a two-storied house extravagance. What was the use of mounting upstairs to go to bed?

On reaching Merthyr the wanderers lodged where they could. The “Star” was the principal inn, the “Crown” was a thatched house. At the “Boot,” Ben Brown, being short of funds, sold his dog for ninepence. It was like parting with his own flesh and blood! Then with the morning they were up, and in consultation with Bacon, who had contracted with Homfray to’ build a forge. The work was done as quickly as possible, for the American war was raging, and guns were needed. In due time the forge was got ready. Every man, woman, and child from the village came up to the opening. Shonny Cwmglo was there with his wonderful harp. Shonny could play every tune, although he had never learned a note, and he played away till he was a hundred, or ever the silver strings were loosed, and, his feeble hands falling from the strings, he laid him down and died. The boys and girls danced, and the men and women raised their voices in gladness when the forge was started.

A species of delirium seized upon everybody, and the harper played like the fiddler of Prague, increasing the madness. Homfray seizing Hemus’s new hat, a wonderful thing, threw it under the hammer, and his own followed like magic. Ale houses did a great trade that day and night. Robert Peel’s policemen and “Bruce” were all in the far-off future at that time. Many of the pioneers died at a brave old age, long before- policemen came into existence.

For several years Bacon and the Homfrays worked well together, but one day there was a falling out, and a fight, and the friendship was never renewed on the old lines. Homfray did not care to go back again with the Browns and the Wilds, who were now getting settled. Some of them had fallen in love with the dark-eyed daughters of the village; and courting had been so pleasant to a few that others had followed. The broken English of the maidens was so pretty, and their eyes had such a fire in them. Many a girl, though, had to be won by fierce fighting, for the boys of the village had no love for the strangers. On Saturdays, when strangers and villagers met, drank, and fought, the village constable discreetly kept out of the way. Things have changed since then.

To understand the story of the starting of Penydarran we must turn back a page or two of the book of history. Homfray passing by the ravine on the right of the roadway as you ascend from Merthyr to Dowlais, was struck with its adaptability for the site of an ironworks, and rented it for £3 a year. He and two other Homfrays were joined by a Londoner, named Forman, who held some kind of office at the Tower, and had saved a lot of money. Then together they built a furnace, and went along swimmingly. In 1796 they built furnace No. 2, and brought another lot of men from Staffordshire. In that year they fairly eclipsed even Dowlais itself; for while Dowlais turned out 2,100 tons in the year, Penydarran could show a make of 4,100 tons, or nearly double. Penydarran was regarded as the more important centre in every way. We have only to turn to the rate books to see that while Penydarran was rated at £3,000, Dowlais was only rated at £2,000, and Plymouth at £750. By 1803 Penydarran made fifty tons of bar iron weekly. It is to John Davies, father of Mr D. Davies, J.P., of Galon Uchaf, and of the Morriston Tinplate Works, that is due the honour of rolling the first bar. The son afterwards arose to be the owner of the works. What Penydarran accomplished in after days and how under Trevethick its owners started the first locomotive that ever ran, must be left for another paper.