Cwm-y-Glo Chapel – The Melting Pot

Pilgrimage to Cwm-y-Glo

Eighty years ago today, on 13 July 1939, a special service was held in the ruins of Cwm-y-Glo Chapel to mark the 300th anniversary of Non-conformity in Wales. The Merthyr Express, dated 15 July 1939, reported the service, and is transcribed below.

PILGRIMAGE TO CWM-Y-GLO

Welsh Independents’ Service in Chapel Ruins

Delegates from 55 churches attached to the North Glamorgan Association of Independents on Thursday made a pilgrimage to the ruins of Cwm-y-Glo Chapel, the secret worshipping place of Welsh Dissenters of the 17th Century.

The pilgrimage was part of the celebration of the 300th anniversary of Non-conformity in Wales, and the pilgrimage coincided with the quarterly meeting of the North Glamorgan Association at Ynysgau Congregational Church.

An impressive service was conducted around the ruins of the historic chapel and was attended by about 300 people.

Lying in a secluded spot on the mountainside overlooking the Borough, Cwm-y-Glo was built in 1669 by the Dissenters who had previously held their meetings at Blaencanaid Farm nearby. Blaencanaid became liable to raids by Government spies and soldiers, and for 20 years Cwm-y-Glo was used as a secret worshipping place until 1689 when the Toleration Act gave religious freedom to all Non-conformists.

Services were continued for many years afterwards until the members formed themselves into two groups – one going to Cefn Coed and the other to Ynysgau Chapel.

At the service at Cwm-y-Glo on Thursday an address was given by the Rev J T Rogers, pastor of Zoar Welsh Congregational Church, Merthyr, on “The Struggles of the Dissenters in the Merthyr area and the history of their worshipping places”. Mr Thomas Edwards of Edwardsville, president of the North Glamorgan Association, presided and prayer was offered by the Rev Watkin Jones.

Principal John Morgan Jones of the Bangor Independent College proposed a vote of thanks to the Rev J T Rogers and Mr W T Owen, Director of Education, seconded. The service concluded with the Benediction given by the Rev Cyril Bowen, Troedyrhiw.

ASSOCIATIONS CONFERENCE

A conference was held at Ynysgau Chapel in the morning, when Mr Thos. Edwards presided. Reports of the activities of the association during the past quarter were given by the Rev J T Rogers, secretary of the association.

The Rev H P Hughes, Cwmbach, was elected missionary secretary for the association and the Rev Glannant Jones, Aberdare, was appointed secretary of the Peace Committee.

Following the conference a service was held when the preacher was the Rev J R Salmon, Pontlottyn. Others who took part in the service were the Rev W Walters, Abernant; the Revs D C Jenkins, W Morse and W R Davies.

During the conference the Rev J T Rogers, who has been the association’s secretary for the past 12 years, was presented with a typewriter in recognition of his services. The presentation was made by Mr J Lewis, Aberdare, and Mr Rogers suitably responded.

A public meeting was held in the evening when the mayor, Mr Isaac Edwards, J.P. presided. The Rev T Glyndwr Jones, Dowlais, took the devotions, and addresses were given by Mr R Hopkin Morris, M.A., Director of the West Regional BBC Station, Cardiff, and Principal J Morgan Jones M.A.

A photograph of the service at the ruins of Cwm-y-Glo Chapel

Merthyr’s Chapels: Ynysgau Chapel

Following on from the previous article, the next chapel we are going to look at is Ynysgau Chapel – the oldest and arguably most important chapel in the town.

Ynysgau Chapel in the early 1900’s. Photo courtesy of http://www.alangeorge.co.uk/index.htm

As has mentioned in an earlier entry (http://www.merthyr-history.com/?p=301), the early Non-Conformist worshippers had been meeting in a small chapel in Cwm-y-Glo. In 1749 the lease at Cwm-y-Glo expired, and due to the ever-growing congregation, it was decided to build a new chapel in the centre of Merthyr Tydfil.

It is said that the land which lies between the site of the Old Iron Bridge down to Swan Street was offered to the Non-Conformists at that time for the sum of £5 per annum “as long as a stone remains in the Taff river bed”. However, the members lacked enterprise and instead, bought the land on which the chapel stood in February 1749, and the first Ynysgau chapel was built with Samuel Davies being ordained as the first minister.

In 1785, Daniel Davies, a student from Carmarthen Presbyterian College was ordained as minister of the chapel. Although remaining for over twenty-five years, Davies’ ministry was not a successful one. The congregation at this time was still a mixture of various groups, and due to dissatisfaction with Davies’ style of preaching, the various groups began to split apart. One group left in 1788 to start a Baptist cause which would eventually lead to the formation of Zion Chapel in Twynyrodyn, and in 1794 the Calvinists left to start their own cause which led to the formation of Pennsylvania (later Pontmorlais) Chapel. The remaining worshippers became an Independent church, but even so, a number of the congregation thought that Daniel Davies’ ministry wasn’t rousing or evangelical enough for their tastes and split away from Ynysgau to hold their own meetings at the Crown Inn. This was the nucleus for Zoar Chapel.

In 1811, during the ordination of a subsequent minister, Rev Thomas Benjamin Evans, the gallery of the chapel collapsed due to overcrowding. Luckily everyone escaped from the accident. The ministry of Rev T B Evans wasn’t an entirely successful one. Following a promising early part of his ministry, Thomas Evans soon lost the confidence of his congregation due to his fondness for alcohol, and the congregation dwindled to almost nothing.

In an attempt to save the cause, 60 members of Zoar Chapel came to Ynysgau to boost the membership. Following Rev Evans death in 1851, Rev James Morris was inducted as the minister. The chapel flourished, and in 1853 it was decided to build a larger chapel.

Ynysgau Chapel in the 1960s. Photo courtesy of Tony Hyde

The new chapel was officially opened in Easter Week 1854, and remained a successful cause well into the latter half of the 20^th Century.

The chapel was forced to close and was demolished in 1967 as part of the redevelopment of the town centre, and it has often been said it was a sad decision to demolish such an important part of Merthyr’s history, especially as nothing stands on the site of the chapel.

There was a graveyard, inaugurated in 1750 attached to Ynysgau. The graveyard was one of the oldest in Merthyr with some tombstones dating back to 1773 and 1776; when the Chapel was demolished the remains of those buried at Ynysgau Chapel were exhumed between 10 – 27 October 1969, and re-interred at the Ffrwd section of the Cefn Cemetery. Further unidentified human remains were found at the site during excavation for a new road and were re-interred at Cefn Cemetery on 6 March 1998.

If you would like to learn more about Ynysgau Chapel, there is a fully-illustrated booklet available detailing the history of the chapel.

It costs £5 including postage and packing. All proceeds go towards the running of this blog.

If you would like to purchase a copy of the booklet, please contact me at: merthyr.history@gmail.com.

Merthyr’s Chapels: Hen Dy Cwrdd, Cefn Coed

We continue our series on Merthyr’s chapels with a look at one of the oldest causes in the Borough.

Hen Dy Cwrdd is the oldest chapel in the borough of Merthyr Tydfil. The chapel was originally built in 1747 when the Unitarians split from the congregation at Cwm-y-Glo and built their own small chapel at Cefn Coed.

This original building was built in a clearing in the wood between the Taf Fechan and the Taf Fawr rivers. It was a small barn-like structure, similar to the chapel at Cwm-y-Glo, with very small windows and a thatched roof. Indeed, the thatched roof wasn’t replaced by tiles until 1792.

An artists impression of the original Hen Dy Cwrdd Chapel

In 1765, Anthony Bacon built the first furnace at Cyfarthfa Iron Works and the wood was stripped of trees, and a small village began to grow in the clearing which became Cefn Coed y Cymer. Just over a century later, amid the rapid population explosion, a new chapel was built to cater for the ever growing congregation. The architect was John Lewis of Vaynor. £434 was collected via subscriptions by the members of the chapel and the new building opened in December 1853.

This chapel was very badly damaged in a storm and major repairs were necessary. The opportunity was taken to carry out various alterations and the chapel was virtually rebuilt in 1894/5 at a cost of £750, and so the present building took shape.

Hen Dy Cwrdd is considered to be an outstanding building and in 1985 it was listed by CADW Grade II, as being of Special Architectural and Historic Interest, and they made a considerable contribution to extensive refurbishment work, and in 1995-7 the chapel was re-erected using the masonry and fittings of the 1895 structure and is an almost exact replica of that building.

The reopening in 1997 coincided with the celebration of the chapel’s 250th Anniversary.

The Birth of Non-Conformity in Merthyr

by Steve Brewer

Religious dissent in the Merthyr area has existed since the middle of the 16th Century. In the 1540’s, a man called Tomos Llewellyn of Rhigos translated William Tyndale’s English translation of the New Testament into Welsh. Llewellyn travelled widely across North Glamorgan and left the seeds of his dissenting beliefs in what was then the village of Merthyr Tydfil. A number of the villagers adopted these beliefs and clung stubbornly to them when the persecution of the Dissenters got underway under the Stuart kings. No matter how stubborn they were in their beliefs, they still had to be converted. If they were found practicing their beliefs, they were given sentences of imprisonment or death.

It is unclear when exactly Non-Conformity started in earnest in Merthyr but we can be sure that it had firmly taken root by the beginning of the 1600’s. The most conclusive evidence regarding the birth of Non-Conformity in Merthyr can be found in the papers of Rev Nathaniel Jones, the rector of the Parish of Merthyr Tydfil between 1640 and 1662. Amongst his papers was found a manuscript, written at some time in the early 1650’s giving a history of the troubles in the town at the time of the Long Parliament – the English Parliament summoned in November 1640 by King Charles I to raise the money he needed to wage the second Bishops’ War against the Scots which eventually led to the English Civil War.

In the manuscript Rev Jones states: “We have, in Merthyr Tydfil parish, a fellowship of men and women, who have for some time been in the habit of holding conventicles, in which some have formulated an ecclesiastical constitution according to their own wishes, contrary to the prevalent laws and regulations of the State Church”. The document emphasizes that this had been going on for about 30 years, so it is safe to argue that the Non-Conformists started holding regular meetings in about 1620. It was then that Non-Conformists from both Merthyr and Aberdare started meeting at Blaencanaid Farm.

Under the aegis of Oliver Cromwell, Parliament relaxed the laws against the Non-Conformists and they began to meet openly. Following the restoration of Charles II to the throne however, new stringent laws were passed against Non-Conformity, foremost amongst these was the Conventicle Act of 1664. The Non-Conformist worshippers, who now numbered between 300 – 400, had to return to meeting in secret at Blaencanaid. They were in constant danger of antagonism and arrest, so a number of men were elected as ‘watchers’ to keep watch whilst the meetings were taking place and warn the worshippers of any imminent danger. Despite all of their difficulties the congregation flourished, so a new meeting place was found at a barn belonging to Cwm-y-Glo Farm. As well as being larger, the new meeting place was more secluded and thus safer than Blaencanaid.

In 1689 the Toleration Act was passed which granted freedom of worship to all Dissenters. As a result the worshippers at Cwm-y-Glo decided to build a proper chapel for themselves. The landowner, Captain David Jenkins, granted them permission to build a chapel at Cwm-y-Glo which was completed in 1690. The congregation at Cwm-y-Glo at this time comprised of many different groups – Quakers, Presbyterians, Arminians and Anabaptists.

For many years, all went peacefully at Cwm-y-Glo until disputes arose over points of religious dogma, and a bitter argument followed. This is not surprising since the congregation of Dissenters comprised many different denominations. The main split came in 1741 when the Unitarians left to establish their own church at Hen Dy Cwrdd, Cefn Coed. In 1752, Cwm-y-Glo itself was closed when the remaining congregation moved to their new chapel in Merthyr town – Ynysgau.

Non-conformity was firmly established by the end of the 18^th Century. The Baptists established Zion Chapel in 1788 and Ebenezer Chapel in 1794, the Calvinistic Methodists established Pennsylvania (Pontmorlais) Chapel in 1793, and the Independents managed to establish Zoar Chapel in 1798 and Bethesda in 1807 as well as having acquired Ynysgau. Lastly, the Wesleyans established their chapel in 1796.

Between 1789 and 1850, at least forty places of worship were licensed in Merthyr, Dowlais and Penydarren alone.