From the Merthyr Express 80 years ago today…..
Tag: Tabernacle Chapel (Treharris)
Never too old!!!
From the Merthyr Express 70 years ago today….
Merthyr’s Chapels: Ebenezer Chapel, Trelewis
The next chapel in our regular feature is Ebenezer Welsh Independent Chapel in Trelewis. Today is an apt date for featuring Ebenezer Chapel, as 130 years ago today (30 September 1889), the foundation stones of the chapel were laid.
In 1870, members of Libanus Chapel, Quakers Yard started a Sunday School in Trelewis, firstly at Penygroesheol and then at Pontsquire.
In 1875 a schoolroom was built on a piece of land belonging to Bontnewydd Farm, and in 1877 the cause was instituted as a branch of Libanus Chapel under the pastorate of Rev G B Williams.
Within two years however, the Deep Navigation Colliery opened and the town of Treharris was built. When it was realised that Treharris was developing more quickly than Trelewis, a number of the members of the congregation wanted to move the chapel to Treharris, and in April 1880 about 40 of them founded Tabernacle Chapel in Treharris.
Ebenezer was then left with only thirteen members, but they were determined to carry on and the congregation gradually began to grow again. By 1883, the congregation had grown to over forty people and Rev John Evans, minister at Penuel Chapel, Nelson became minister of Ebenezer in a joint pastorate with Penuel.
By 1889 the congregation had grown to an extent that it was decided to build a more substantial chapel, and the foundation stones of the chapel were laid in September 1889 by Sir Alfred Thomas M.P. (Lord Pontypridd), and Thomas Williams of Merthyr. The chapel was designed by Mr John Williams of Merthyr and the builder was Mr D Jenkins of Dowlais.
The total cost of the building was £900, a large amount of which was raised at a grand bazaar in 1890.
The chapel was a very successful cause for many years, but like nearly all the chapels in the borough, numbers dwindled after the Second World War, and the chapel eventually closed and was demolished.
Merthyr’s Lost Landmarks: Treharris Public Hall
Merthyr has last so many of its important buildings and landmarks in the name of ‘progress’. In a new regular feature, I hope to highlight some of the marvellous places that have disappeared into the ether.
We start with Treharris Public Hall. The following article is taken from the marvellous website http://www.treharrisdistrict.co.uk, and is transcribed here with the kind permission of the webmaster, Paul Corkrey.
Treharris Public Hall
During 1891, the growing population of Treharris and its districts, meant there was a growing need for a large public hall to be built, to benefit the people. The cost of the project was the main concern and it was decided to hold concerts to raise funds and shares were to be sold to enable it to be a reality.
One such concert took place in August 1891. A huge marquee capable of seating an immense number of persons was obtained and erected near Bargoed House. Through the kindness of Deep Navigation Colliery manager, Mr Stewart, the marquee was illuminated most effectively with electric light. Mr Alan Wyn conducted the Treharris Choral Union, in an excellent performance of Haydn’s “Creation”, a large crowd attended and good funds were secured to get the project moving.
On 3 October 1891, The Merthyr Express reported that practical steps had been made towards having a public hall built in Treharris. A meeting had been held In Perrott Street, at the Tabernacle Vestry, the colliery manager (Mr Stewart) presided, with all classes of people represented. The meeting decided to canvas for shares and a large number have been taken. Mr W Cuthbert Thomas was appointed secretary. It was proposed to erect the new public hall on the square, at a cost of about £2,000.
A further meeting took place three weeks later and a committee was appointed to deal with the site and further matters.
The Merthyr Express, November 21 1891 further reported that to show interest, the Colliery Company, wanted to take an interest in the welfare of their workmen, and promised to give £50 a year for 5 years, towards the hall, about to be built. This is in addition to subscribing towards 250 shares in the hall company and letting the ground, which is in the very centre of the village and is most valuable, at the nominal rent of 5 shillings per annum.
Two concerts were held in October 1892, to raise further monies for the public hall, the first was presided over by Mr Stewart the colliery manager, whilst the second was under the presidency of the Rev D Phillips. They were both held at the Tabernacle Chapel and both raised goodly sums.
May 1893, was an exciting time for the District and the huge building constructed on the square was now completed and ready to be opened…the Merthyr Express reported “that the directors of the Public Hall Company should be congratulated on having secured a handsome and commodious building, in return for their outlay. The formal opening is planned for Whit Monday and tickets for admission are keenly sought.”
A public procession was arranged with Brass bands, it started at 1pm prompt and many hundreds lined the streets and joined the procession.
Other reports suggest the final cost of the Public Hall was around £3,300, but it included a Library, committee rooms and reading rooms. The library had over 1400 books, some in Welsh, it was financially supported by contributions from miners wages.
The Miners Workmens Hall served the community for almost 100 years. It was a community building and was used for great events, with huge crowds attending. It was a Theatre and became known as the “Palace”, a popular cinema for many years. It later fell into disrepair and was used as a bingo hall, snooker club and even as an indoor market (for one week).
The building was a typical Workmen’s’ Hall design with two shops at its base, either side of the entrance and facing the square. In 1920 one shop unit was a grocery store and the other housed a branch of Barclays Bank.
By 1937 it was the Palace Theatre, and had a 28 feet wide proscenium and a 20 feet deep stage. There were three dressing rooms. At that time the Palace Theatre was equipped with a Klang-Tobis sound sytem. By 1954, an RCA sound system had been fitted. By 1963, Cinema scope had been installed, with a screen within the original 28 feet wide proscenium. There were now four dressing rooms. The Palace Cinema was still open in 1966, but had closed by 1980.
The demolition of the Palace Cinema commenced on the 25th of January 2000. The site has been acquired by the Merthyr Tydfil Housing Association who are proposing to construct flats on the site. That was later discounted a green area was put there before further redevelopment in 2013.
During 1996, there were plans to try to save the building, now under private ownership, many of the villagers did not want to lose the historic building. Unfortunately, it was not to be and by 2000 the building was totally demolished, a sad end to the Hall, a landmark building, which could have been preserved for future generations.
Merthyr Memories: Discovering Tabernacle Orchestra, Treharris
by Christine Trevett
When I was at school at the start of the 1960s one of the books we had to study for the English literature exam was Thomas Hardy’s Under the Greenwood Tree. Our English teacher said it was a gentle masterpiece. I hated it – it was all ‘rural’ and about Victorians regretting a lost age. Yet I did quite like the plot line about abolishing the church’s string orchestra. There was a plan to replace it with a mechanical organ. I’d never heard of a church orchestra and I’d certainly never seen one. I played in the Merthyr Borough youth orchestra at the time, though, so I felt some sympathy about losing a music group.
It was in that English class that one of my friends said there was an orchestra in her own chapel in Treharris, where I lived too, and it had had one for longer than anyone could remember. She played in it. Then one summer she asked if I’d go along one Sunday instead of her, as she was going on holiday. I was used to chapels and curious, so I said yes, though all I knew of it was that this chapel had had a minister referred to locally as ‘Thomas Tab’ and that the building was one of two chapels facing each other on Perrott Street, each side of the main street just below ‘The Square’, which was the hub of Treharris town.
The language of the chapel was Welsh. I had no idea when I turned up at Tabernacle Chapel that for them this was the tail end of a very lively orchestral tradition indeed. It was more than half a century later that I came across the photograph on the Internet headed Tabernacle Orchestral Society, Treharris: winners orchestral competition, Royal National Eisteddfod of Wales, Barry, 1920. It showed just two female players among over thirty musicians, with an age range from schoolboys to the very mature.
The chapel, built in 1883, was bigger than my own, which was two years older and far from small itself. Tabernacle had hosted great congregations in the 1905 religious revival. It was rich in panelled pews, balustrade, mouldings and an impressive pulpit front (the building would be Grade 2 listed in due course). The part of the chapel I remember best, though, from the two occasions (I think) when I joined the string players, was the spot on the balcony from which the music came.
There were just a few players accompanying hymns. I was on the ’cello. The galleries raked steeply and the floor felt slightly sloping where we sat, just a few chairs and some music stands. This teenager’s imagination was working overtime in the unfamiliar setting, sitting alongside others who knew all the ropes and knew exactly what they were doing. The whole building was ‘weighty’ and this youngster was nervous. What if the spike of the ’cello slid and slipped into one of those small gaps between floorboards, and got wedged? It would be like some animated cartoon – the player using knees to wrestle with the thing while still keeping the bass part going using both hands. I tried not to move much. It didn’t happen of course.
I knew at the time that I was experiencing something being kept alive by the skin of its teeth. Chapels had organs and probably a piano in the vestry as well. Yet many nonconformists in the 19th century hadn’t been entirely at ease as organs and harmoniums were being installed. It had seemed ‘popish’ to some. Tabernacle, in decades past, had encouraged and built an orchestral fellowship that went beyond anything needed to accompany hymns and now it didn’t want even that to be ended.
Nowadays instrumental ensembles are common in churches and chapels again – a fiddle, a flute and piano/keyboard perhaps, in a modern ‘worship group’, or some people looking like a rock group in another. Some very successful churches have much more variety than this, to take account of all tastes at different services. So the tradition’s far from dead. You could say it’s been resurrected.
The Cymanfa Ganu
In years gone by, the most important event for the chapels of Merthyr (and indeed all of Wales) was the annual Cymanfa (literally translated as assembly or festival). As well as the Cymanfa Bregethu (preaching festival) there was also, more significantly and more famously the annual Cymanfa Ganu or Cymanfa Gerddorol (singing or music festival).
The first ever Cymanfa Ganu was held in Aberdare in 1873, and was inaugurated by Rev John Roberts (Ieuan Gwyllt) formally of Bethlehem Chapel, Caepantywyll, and the first Cymanfa Ganu was held in Merthyr Tydfil by the Calvinistic Methodists in 1874 at Pontmorlais Chapel.
The Welsh Baptists held their first Cymanfa Ganu in 1886 at Zion Chapel, Twynyrodyn and the Welsh Independents followed two years later holding their first Cymanfa Ganu in 1888 at Zoar Chapel.
Traditionally, the Welsh Baptists held their Cymanfa on Easter Monday, alternating between Zion Chapel, Twynyrodyn and Tabernacle Chapel; the Independents held their Cymanfa on Easter Tuesday at Zoar Chapel (and later at Gellideg Chapel) and the Methodists held their Cymanfa on the first Monday in May at Pontmorlais Chapel until it closed and then at Zoar Chapel until 1984 and afterwards at Hope Chapel.
As well as this, the Dowlais Baptists and Independents held their own separate Cymanfa’s, with the Independents holding theirs on Easter Monday and the Baptists on Easter Tuesday – both Cymanfa’s being held at Bethania Chapel. This continued until the 1960’s when both denominations amalgamated their Cymanfa’s to hold a joint Cymanfa on Easter Tuesday.
The Treharris and district Baptists and Independents also held their own Cymanfa’s – respectively on Easter Monday at Brynhyfyd Chapel and Easter Tuesday at Tabernacle Chapel.
Below are copies of: the programme for the 1911 Cymanfa Ganu held by the Methodist Chapels of Merthyr at Pontmorlais Chapel 106 years ago today; a programme for the Merthyr Independent Cymanfa of 1918; a programme for the Merthyr Baptist Cymanfa of 1937 and a programme for the Dowlais Joint Cymanfa of 1972.
