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.
We must now start from the Dynevor Arms towards the Iron Bridge. A curriery premises was erected and for some time carried on a little way down on the right hand by Messrs M. Davies and Wayne. This was one of the Davies’s of Pantyscallog and a Wayne of the Gadlys, but Mr Wayne migrated to the Carmarthen Tinplate Works, which he carried on for many years.
Anterior to the curriery there was in this very locality a nailmaker working by the name of Samuel Jones. At this time all nails were made by hand (cut and wire nails not yet known). They were all made of slit rods, a process that, as far as South Wales works are concerned, has entirely ceased, and the making of a nail was really a good specimen of the handicraft. There was a small bellows blowing upon the point of the nail, and the work was always carefully held so that the air current passed up the rod. The why and wherefore of this has many a time been thought over, and I acknowledge that no satisfactory solution has ever been found.
Lower down was the residence of of Mr Coffin, who, in addition to curriery, was, or had been, the clerk of the Small Debts Court, and thus became very obnoxious to some, so that at the time of the Merthyr Riots his house and furniture suffered damage at the hands of the mob. One of his daughters afterwards married Mr Thomas Wayne, and resided at Glancynon, near the Gadlys. The other married a Mr William Llewellyn, of Abercarn, the then mineral and other agent of the Llanover Estates. There was a jeu d’esprit in the Cardiff and Merthyr Guardian in or about the time of Mr Wayne’s marriage, showing how very careful he had been, for he not only obtained a wife, but a coffin also.
The British Schools followed Mr Coffin’s garden, and then the Three Horse Shoes Inn, kept by a Daniel Stephens. The next and adjoining was the premises of Mr John Bryant, whose curriery was (as Mr Coffin’s was also) across the road, and Mr Bryant also took Pride’s storehouse for his trade purposes after the railway had rendered canal traffic obsolete, or rather obsolete as far as shop goods were concerned, to Merthyr at that time.
Close to Mr Bryant’s house is a way to Aberdare, which joins the road up from the Dynevor Arms, close beyond Mr Jeffries’ house. On the opposite side of this opening was the Cyfarthfa Surgery. Mr Edward Davies was the head, and in physique always reminded me of the Emperor Nicholas of Russia. Years after, Dr Davies lived at the Court House, and practised after he had left Cyfarthfa. The Miners’ Arms was adjoining. The residences coming next were built by a Mr Teague subsequently.
To be continued at a later date…….