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NOW! 3200 titles on the Welsh American Bookstore . More added every day.

Just a quick heads up. We noted that several visitors found the old search somewhat slow and visually unappealing so we have changed over to Google custom search for faster and hopefully more relevant results. The search box is in the same location but the rtesults now appear on the screen in a pop up as per the screen shots below:-

We hope that this will lead to an overall improvement in search speed and relevance for all our visitors. Meantime don't forget to check out the many hundreds of new titles and articles we have added over the past few weeks. Here are but a few:-

NEW! Catherine Fisher section

NEW! Daniel Owen Fireside Tales

NEW! Simon Weston Launches New Childrens Book

On 23rd October 1739 the War of Jenkins' Ear Began

The War of Jenkins' Ear was a conflict between Great Britain and Spain that lasted from 1739 to 1748.

Robert Jenkins, from Llanelli, was captain of a British merchant ship, returning home from the West Indies when his ship was boarded by the Spanish on suspicion of smuggling.  The Spanish commander bound Jenkins to the mast and cut off one of his ears.  He then told him to tell his King, that he would get the same.

On his return, Jenkins exhibited his severed year in Parliament and this was the spark that ignited a simmering resentment towards the Spanish, who had reneged on an agreement for Britain to sell slaves in Spanish America

 After 1742, this war became part of the much larger, War of the Austrian Succession, in which most of the states in Europe became involved. In particular, France and Britain, who were fighting each other for control of the American and Asian Colonies.

Born on this day 1926 in Tonypandy. 

Glyn Houston - film and television actor, who served in the army during World War II.  He is the brother of the late film actor Donald Houston. 

Houston is perhaps best remembered for his role as "Duncan Thomas", in the 1980s British sitcom Keep It in the Family.  His other credits include My Good Woman, It Ain't Half Hot Mum, Softly, Softly, Minder, Inspector Morse,  and Doctor Who.  

The Guildhall in Swansea was formally opened on 23rd October 1934.

The Guildhall is one of the main office buildings of the City and County of Swansea Council.   The complex comprises the City Hall, Brangwyn Hall (concert hall) and the County Law Courts for Swansea.  The building is finished in white Portland stone and includes the landmark, tall art deco clock-tower.  

The Claerwen reservoir and dam in the Elan Valley in Powys was formally opened on 23rd October 1952.

It was the last addition to the Elan Valley Reservoirs  system built to provide for the increasing water demand of Birmingham.  During its construction, it was necessary to employ the services of Italian Stonemasons as British ones were still at work in London during the post-war rebuilding process of the late 1940s.  The dam took six years to complete and is almost the size of all the other reservoirs in the Elan Valley system combined.   

On 23rd October 1863, Festiniog Railway, was the first public narrow gauge railway in the world, to introduce steam locomotives into general service.

The line was constructed between 1833 and 1836 to transport slate from the quarries around the inland town of Blaenau Ffestiniog to the coastal town of Porthmadog where it was loaded onto ships. The railway line was was sloped, so that loaded wagons could be run by gravity downhill all the way from Blaenau Ffestiniog to the port. The empty wagons were then hauled back up by horses.

During the late 1850s, it became clear that the line was reaching its operational capacity while the output of the Blaenau Ffestiniog slate quarries continued to rise. In 1860, the board of the company began to investigate the possibility of introducing steam locomotives to increase the carrying capacity of the railway. In 1862 the company advertised for manufacturers to tender to build the line's first locomotives. In February 1863, the bid of George England and Co. was accepted and production of the first locomotives was begun.

These steam locomotives allowed much longer slate trains to be run and this also enabled the official introduction of passenger trains in 1865: the Ffestiniog was the first narrow gauge railway in Britain to carry passengers.

Today, the Ffestiniog Railway is a major tourist attraction located mainly within the Snowdonia National Park, travelling through both forested and mountainous scenery.

Simon Weston Launches New Childrens Book

Having recently won a public vote to become the winner of The One Shows Peoples Portrait, Simon Weston is this week launching his new childrens book.

Get Fit with Nelson will be published on 25 October with a photo call at Londons Hyde Park on Thursday, 24 October at 10am . The latest book in the series charting Nelsons adventures, tackles two very important issues improving your health and getting fit and the importance of not judging people by their appearance.

Read more...

On 22nd October 1942 the Welsh Courts Act 1942 was enacted.

Since the Acts of Union in 1536, only English had been used in the law courts, ignoring the fact that most people in Wales only spoke Welsh.  The 1942 act gave Welsh people the right to use Welsh in courts providing that the Welsh speaker was under a disadvantage in having to speak English.

This was by no means an ideal situation, as such a disadvantage had to be proved and there was a problem in finding a judge or magistrate who understood the Welsh language.  However, it can be seen as a slackening of legislation which ultimately led to the Welsh Language Act 1967, which  gave rise to the concept of 'equal validity' between the Welsh and English languages and was a much more robust and useful piece of legislation.

Today is the feast day of Saint Mellon

Saint Mellon (Mellionius) was born c.229 in Cardiola (Cardiff), the son of local Welsh nobility.

Whilst in Rome accompanying taxes due from the province, he heard Pope Stephen I preaching and was converted to Christianity, being baptized by Stephen shortly afterwards.

He sold his property and gave the profits to the poor, studied Christianity and was ordained.  He then received a vision of an angel telling him to evangelize the area of Rouen in modern France, where he became its first bishop and performed many miracles including an exorcism where he cast out devils from monkeys.  He died in 311 and is buried in St Gervais Church, Rouen.

On 22nd - 23rd October 1916,  at Macukovo (now called Evzonoi) in Greece, during the First World War, Hubert William Lewis, from Milford Haven, a private in the 11th Battalion, the Welch Regiment, single-handedly attacked and captured three enemy soldiers and despite being wounded himself, went under heavy shell and rifle fire, to bring a wounded colleague back to safety. 

For this action, he was awarded the Victoria Cross and later the Medaille Militaire by France.  

On 22nd October 1644 Powis Castle near Welshpool was captured by Parliamentary troops during The English Civil War.

A timeline of the history of Powis Castle;

Powis Castle (Castell Powis) near "Pool' (Welshpool) was the stronghold of the ancient kingdom of  Powys,  whose rivalry with Gwynedd combined with their proximity to England, resulted in their leaders switching allegiance when necessary to ensure survival 

1196  Gwenwynwyn ap Owain Cyfeilog Prince of Powys was driven out of his castle by a combined force of English and Welsh but recovered it during the following year.

1218  Llywelyn ap Iorwerth (Llywelyn the Great) of Gwynedd conquered Powys, forcing Gwenwynwyn into English exile, where he died.

1240  Gwenwynwyn's son Gruffydd returned on Llywelyn's death to retake Powys.

1257  Gruffydd was forced to flee when Llywelyn ap Gruffydd retook the area for Gwynedd.

1264  Gruffydd gave his allegiance back to Llywelyn after the success of Llywelyn and Simon de Montfort against Henry III.

1274  Gruffydd was discovered plotting against Llywelyn and Powis Castle was reportedly razed to the ground, forcing Gruffydd to flee once more.

1277  Gruffydd returned with Edward I's victorious English army in the first Welsh campaign and subsequently regained his lands from the English crown.

1286  Gruffyd's son Owain ap Gruffydd ap Gwenwywyn renounced his title as Prince of Powys and was granted the title of Baron de la Pole.

1579  Sir Edward Herbert bought the lordship and castle from Owain's descendants.  Sir Edward’s wife was a Roman Catholic and held allegiance to the Stuart kings of England.  Powis castle, therefore, became a Royalist stronghold, during the English Civil War. 

1644 ( 22nd October)  Powis Castle was captured by Parliamentary troops, during the English Civil War.

1660  The castle was returned to the Herbert family on the restoration of Charles II and many improvements were made, including, the extraordinary terraced gardens, the grand staircase and the state ballroom.

1784  Edward Clive, the eldest son of Clive of India, married into the Herbert family and the Clive fortune paid for many repairs and improvements,  A collection of Clive mementoes from Indua is on display in the old ballroom.

1952  Powis Castle was bequeathed to the National Trust and is renowned for it's grand terraced gardens and lavish Elizabethan-furnished rooms   

On 22nd October 2009, the second phase of "The St David's Centre" in Cardiff opened, putting Cardiff within the top five shopping destinations in the United Kingdom.

The second phase consists of 3 main buildings in total; the Central Library building, the John Lewis department store, and the main shopping area, which is built on the form Oxford Arcade. It has added an extra 967,500 sq ft of retail space, 3,000 car parking spaces and 4,500 permanent jobs to the city centre at a total cost of £675m.

In 2008-9, the centre attracted 27 million people, making it one of the busiest shopping centres in the European Union, exceeding Birmingham's Bull Ring.

St David's was crowned the international shopping centre of the year in 2010 by Global Retail Leisure International.  

From 22nd - 31st October 1998, a series of storms hit Wales bringing substantial rainfall to all parts with the highest daily rainfall recorded at Treherbert, with 92.2 mm.  Elsewhere, rivers overtopped their banks, inundating their flood plains and causing extensive flooding in many Welsh towns

Since then many flood defence schemes have been undertaken,  however, the Environment Agency has warned that due to changing weather patterns, flooding will remain a real threat and is likely to increase. 

Book of the Day 10/21/13 The Welsh Language: A Pocket Guide (University of Wales - Pocket Guide) The Welsh Language Act 1993 is 21 today!! This book offers a brief history of the Welsh language from the earliest times to the present.

http://welsh-american-bookstore.com/index.php/BookLibrary/Welsh-Welsh-American-History/Welsh-History/The-Welsh-Language-A-Pocket-Guide-University-of-Wales-Pocket-Guide.html

At 9.15 am on Friday, October 21, 1966, a waste tip above the mining village of Aberfan began to slide down the mountainside, firstly destroying a farm cottage and killing all its occupants. It then approached Pantglas Junior School, where the children had only just returned to their classes after singing All Things Bright and Beautiful at their morning assembly. The slide then engulfed the school and about 20 houses in the village, killing 144 people, including 116 school children

Workers up in the mountain had seen the slide start, but could not raise the alarm because their telephone cable had been stolen and down in the village, everybody heard the noise, but could see nothing, because of thick fog.

News of the tragedy travelled fast and hundreds of people stopped what they were doing and headed to Aberfan to try and help with the rescue. It was futile, as nobody was rescued alive after 11am and it was nearly a week before all the bodies were recovered.

On Mynydd Merthyr, directly above Aberfan. several tips containing millions of cubic metres of mining debris from the Merthyr Vale Colliery had been deposited over the years, onto highly porous sandstone that contained numerous underground springs. The NCB's area management had been made aware of the concerns regarding the tipping of spoil above the primary school, but these were largely ignored. In the days leading up to the disaster, there had been substantial bursts of heavy rain, which had caused 3–6 metres of subsidence on one of the tips. This then led to more than 150,000 cubic metres of debris breaking away and flowing downhill at high speed.

On 26th October 1966, a tribunal was appointed to inquire into the causes of and circumstances relating to the Aberfan disaster, which was chaired by Welsh barrister and Privy Councillor Lord Justice Edmund Davies.

The Tribunal's report found that

* The blame for the disaster rested entirely with the National Coal Board, and their "total absence of a tipping policy"

* Repeated warnings about the dangerous condition of the tip had been ignored.

* The tips had never been surveyed and were continuously being added to in a chaotic and unplanned manner. The disregard for the unstable geological conditions and the NCB's failure to act after previous smaller slides were found to have been major factors that contributed to the catastrophe.

On 21st October 1993 the Welsh Language Act 1993 was enacted.  It put Welsh and English on an equal basis, when providing services to the public in Wales and represents a milestone in the modern history of the language.

The Laws in Wales Acts 1535 - 1542 had made English the only language of the law courts and other aspects of public administration in Wales. The Welsh Courts Act 1942 had given the right to use Welsh in courts providing that the Welsh speaker was under a disadvantage in having to speak English and The Welsh Language Act 1967 gave rise to the concept of 'equal validity' between the Welsh and English languages, which resulted in Governmental Departments issuing documents in Welsh.  Then following a campaign of vandalising unilingual English road signs by members of Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg, local councils were allowed to provide many bilingual signs.  However it was the Welsh Language Act 1993 which established that 'in the course of public business and the administration of justice that both languages are to be treated on the basis of equality.'

The Act achieved three things:

* Setting up the Welsh Language Board, with the duty of promoting the use of Welsh and ensuring compliance with the other provisions.

* Giving people the right to use Welsh in court proceedings.

* All organisations in the public sector in Wales, being obliged to treat Welsh and English on an equal basis.  

Born on this day 1930 in Abersychan

Bryn Meredith - former Wales and Lions rugby international. Meredith was a mobile hooker, who played club rugby for Newport and London Welsh and is generally considered to be one of the finest forwards of all time.  

Born on this day 1944 in Pontyates

Mandy Rice-Davies - best known for her association with Christine Keeler and her role in the Profumo affair.

As a child, Rice-Davies moved to Solihull with her family and at 16 she went to London, where she appeared as 'Miss Austin' at the Earls Court Motor Show. She then got a job as a showgirl where she met Christine Keelor who introduced her to the well-connected osteopath Stephen Ward. Then in December 1962, while Keeler was visiting Rice-Davies, one of Keeler's former boyfriends, John Edgecombe, attempted to enter and fired several times at the door with a gun. His subsequent trial brought attention to the girls' involvement with many influential people, including the then Viscount Astor and the War Minister John Profumo. It was Profumo's relationship with Keeler that discredited the Conservative government of Harold Mcmillan and caused Profumo to resign.

Later Ward was brought to trial, charged with living off the immoral earnings of Keeler and Rice-Davies and it was whilst giving her evidence that Rice-Davies made her now famous riposte, when the prosecuting counsel pointed out that Viscount Astor denied an affair or having even met her, she replied, "He would, wouldn't he?" and by 1979, this phrase had entered the third edition of the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations.

Later in life, Mandy Rice-Davies traded on the notoriety the trial brought her, she converted to Judaism and married the Israeli businessman, Rafi Shauli. The pair opened nightclubs and restaurants in Tel Aviv, called Mandy's Candies, Mandy's Singing Bamboo and Mandy's. Rice-Davies also made a series of unsuccessful pop singles in the mid-1960s.

On October 20th 1886, the city of Trelew in the province of Chubut, Patagonia in Argentina was founded by Lewis Jones. It is the largest and most populous city in the lower valley of the Chubut River, with an estimated population of 100,000 people. Trelew's foundation is linked with "Y Wladfa" (Welsh settlement in Argentina), one of the leaders of which was Lewis (Luis) Jones, who acted as a spokesman to deal with the Argentine government in the beginning of the 1860s and town was named in his honour. Trelew was the starting point for the Central Chubut Railway line that would link the lower Chubut River Valley toPuerto Madryn.  

Born on this day 1961 in St Asaph

Ian Rush - former Wales soccer international, who scored 28 goals in 73 appearances.

Rush played club football for Liverpool F.C in two spells, from 1980-1987 and 1988-1996, with whom he won  5 English Football League, First Division titles, the FA Cup 3 times and the European Cup twice.  With his 346 goals, he is the club's leading goalscorer of all time.

Born on this day 1836 in Mold, Flintshire. 

Daniel Owen - generally regarded as the foremost Welsh-language novelist of the 19th century.

When Owen was only a baby, his father and two brothers, were killed in a mining accident at the Argoed mine.  This had a catastrophic effect on his family and plunged them into poverty.  As a result, Owen received no formal education.

When he was 12, Owen became an apprentice tailor to, Angel Jones, who was also an elder with the Calvinistic Methodists and this is when he began to write poetry.

Owen then began to enter his poetry into local eisteddfodau, under the    name o f  Glaslwyn and also started to publish his work.  He wanted to become a Methodist preacher, but did not complete the course, so instead in 1867, he became a tailor in Mold and preached on Sundays.  

Born on this day 1971 in Melbourne, Australia (Her mother, Carol Jones, was a dancer from Maesteg)

Dannii Minogue - singer - songwriter, talent show judge and actress, 

Danielle Jane Minogue is the youngest sister of Kylie Minogue and after success in Australia, most notably in the role of Emma Jackson in the popular soap opera "Home and Away" Dannii relocated to London in the early 1990s and is now best known for her regular appearances as a judge on the TV talent show "The X Factor"  

In October 1927, a storm severely damaged the track of the Pwllheli and Llanbedrog Tramway.  It subsequently, never reopened and was the last horse-drawn tram service in Britain.

The tramway was originally built in 1894 for the purposes of carrying stone from the Carreg-y-defaid quarry for the construction of the new holiday resort at Pwllheli.  Soon after, the tramway started to carry passengers and was reported as being packed to capacity during the National Eisteddfod at Pwllheli in 1925. the tramway was reported to be packed to capacity.

At precisely 10.30pm, Fanny Smith and Alice Stammers locked the front door of the fruit shop at number Three, Commerce Place, and pulled down the shutters.

With business over for the day the two women went upstairs to their living quarters as they did each night and settled down to their supper they would come back down later to clear up.

Like so many of the residents of Garnant, neither Fanny nor Alice were natives.

Fanny Mansfield had been born in Bath in 1869 and at the age of 25 was whisked of her feet by a smooth-talking travelling fruit salesman from Wolverhampton by the name of William Henry Smith.

They married in the summer of 1894 and in little over a year, a son Raymond - was born.

All was not well with their new-born however and Raymond was classed as paralysed at birth quite possibly a Victorian diagnosis for cerebral palsy.

For a time at least and quite possibly because of Raymonds condition - the Smith family settled in Bristol. William continued his life as a commercial travelling salesman while Fanny remained at home with Raymond and Phillip, the familys latest addition, who arrived in the early months of 1901.

The Smith family had also gained another albeit unofficial - member by the time Phillip had been born. The couple had taken on a general maid to help relieve the pressure on Fanny while William was on the road.

Alice Stammers was Londoner, born in 1888, and by 1901 was already becoming a fixture in the Smith household. She would remain at Fannys side until the death of her employer in 1950.

By 1911, William too had tired of the life of a travelling salesman and, with Fanny, Phillip and Alice, had set up in business running a fruit shop in Sale, Cheshire. Raymond meanwhile had made a patient at a residential school for epileptic children close by at Nether Alderley, Cheshire.

Life in the north of England did not go especially well for the Smiths however and by the middle of the decade they had returned to Bristol. Raymond died in the city aged 23 in 1918.

Soon after the death of their eldest son, the Smith moved on once more, taking up the tenancy of a vacant shop in the village of Garnant, Carmarthenshire. Alice would help out in the shop as well as with the domestic chores of the household.

Once the two women had lock up the shop and gone upstairs, they settled down to eat in a room at the rear of the first floor of Number Four, Commerce Place.

The room overlooked the rear of the row and beyond towards Arcade Terrace and further still to the Amman Tin Works.

As they sat and ate their meal they heard not a sound nor saw any movement at the rear of Commerce Place.

They heard no barking dogs, no shouts, no awful screams, nor did they see a soul escaping from the rear of Star Stores next door.

To find out more about the unsolved murder of Thomas Thomas in Garnant, Carmarthenshire, visit: murderatthestar.wordpress.com

A little after 10pm, but certainly before 10.30pm, Anne Jeffreys opened the back door of Commerce House and let out Spot the family dog.

The rear of Commerce Place was quiet and Mrs Jeffreys noted nothing untoward before returning indoors while Spot went about his business.

Within minutes however, the peace was shattered.

Spot barked furiously, Mrs Jeffreys said in her statement.

As everything was so quiet outside I shouted to the dog: Whats the matter boy?

The 61-year-old was alone in the house, but was not one to be shaken easily.

It was Anne who, on July 13, 1895, had reached agreement with land-owner Lord Dynevor and finally signed the lease for the vacant plot that would one day house the shops of Commerce Place.

The lease remained in Annes name until she signed it over to her husband Morgan on August 29, 1903, and it was Anne who would remain the named defendant in the 20-year-old legal dispute with the Dynevor Estate which saw the Jeffreys family refuse to pay a penny in a rent until ordered to do so after a bitter High Court battle with Walter FitzUryan Rice, the seventh Baron Dynevor, in July 1915.

She went to the door to see what had so riled the dog, but could see nothing out of the ordinary in the darkness.

I could see nothing so I called the dog to come in, she said.

Spot then came in, so I forgot everything about it.

To find out more about the unsolved murder of Thomas Thomas in Garnant, Carmarthenshire, visit: murderatthestar.wordpress.com

I first became interested in the murder of Thomas Thomas at the Garnant branch of Star Stores after reading the excellent A Long Time Between Murders by Owen Harries in American Scholar magazine.

As a freelance journalist based in south Wales with an unhealthy interest in historic crime, the brutal killing of the timid half-deaf shopkeeper instantly caught my attention - not least because my discovery of the article occurred less than a month before the 93^rdanniversary of the incident and the village of Garnant lies within the area covered by the South Wales Guardian, a weekly newspaper for which I regularly work.

A retelling of the murder to coincide with the anniversary seemed a straightforward and obvious feature idea, so I put together a piece of 600 or 700 words on the crime; the only still-unsolved murder to have taken place within the Amman Valley.

Often in such cases, that would have been enough. However, the case of Thomas Thomas intrigued me. The more I looked, the more the murder hooked me.

The story of the murder at the Star had previously appeared in a number of places not least Dave Michaels excellent Cwmamman History website. However, its various incarnations including my original - are all based on the same two reports from the Amman Valley Chronicle the local newspaper of the time. Everything currently accepted regarding the killing comes from the Chronicles contemporary report and the coverage of the inquest into Thomas Thomas death a few weeks later.

While it is true that both editions of the Chronicle dedicated an unprecedented amount of news space to the reports of each, neither could offer a complete insight into what had taken place and the subsequent investigation.

What struck me most about these reports was the number of clear contradictions they contained particularly between comments made by individuals to the newspaper in the days immediately after the event and the testimony offered by those same people at the court hearing.

Therefore, I kept digging. Soon after publication of the original article I came to realise that the story I had written for the local weekly, while covering all the key elements of the crime and adhering to the accepted version of events, omitted as much as it included.

As my collected files began to mount I decided that the murder of Thomas Thomas deserved far more than just a single-page feature some 93 years after his death.

It also became clear that the events of that fateful night in February 1921 were not merely the story of one doomed individual, but the story of a village, a community and perhaps even the story of Wales during a period which shaped and defined the nation for generations to come.

No one ever stood trial for the murder of Thomas Thomas, but the whisperers and gossip-mongers of the village settled as they always must on a culprit. With the passing of the years the guilt of that one man has entered into valley folklore as all but fact.

My research, while still far from complete, has led me to one undeniable truth: the rumour mill was almost certainly wrong.

To find out more, visit my blog; murderatthestar.wordpress.com