On this day 1764 the immigrant ship "Vine" carrying Welsh Quakers from Merionethshire and bound for the Welsh Tract arrived in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 

The Welsh Tract of Pensylvania;

The period following the restoration of Charles II  to the English throne in 1660 saw the implementation  of religious intolerances which inhibited the rights of several groups, including Quakers, to worship in their chosen fashion. Large numbers of people, in some cases whole communities, elected to leave Wales in order to avoid persecution. In the Court of Great Sessions in Bala, North Wales, threats were made against the lives of Quakers, impelling the society of Welsh Quakers to acquire land from William Penn. This was known as The Welsh Tract, comprising an area of approximately 40,000 acres in and around what is now known as Pennsylvania.  

They began emigrating there in 1682. The first Welsh colony, Cambria, was in western Pennsylvania, and became an area in which the Welsh language, Welsh culture and Welsh religion was conducted in a community with a distinct Welsh identity. It was first established by Morgan John Rhys from Glamorgan, who was a Baptist minister. Many towns in the area still carry Welsh names; places such as Radnor, Haverford Township, Lower Merion, Upper Merion and Bala Cynwyd. Despite the disappointment of the settlers, the original name of the colony was changed. Penn tried to explain the change by writing the following;

"This day, my country was confirmed to me under the great seal of England, with privileges, by the name of Pennsylvania, a name the King would give it in honor of my father. I chose New Wales, being as this, a pretty, hilly country, but Penn being Welsh for head as in Penmanmoire (sic), in Wales, and Penrith, in Cumberland, and Penn, in Buckinghamshire . . . called this Pennsylvania, which is the high or head woodlands; for I proposed, when the secretary, a Welshman, refused to have it called New Wales, Sylvania and they added Penn to it, and though I opposed it and went to the King to have it struck out and altered he said it was past . . nor could twenty guineas move the under-secretary to vary the name"

Thus Pennsylvania was named after the Welsh word for head and not, as is usually supposed, after William Penn himself, although Penn in this regard could be accused of duplicity.The Welsh Society of Philadelphia, which was begun in 1729, is the oldest society of its kind in the United States and it is still very active. Pennsylvania has  provided many people of distinction who have made their influence felt in politics, in the justice system, and in agriculture, as well as in the manufacture of iron and steel.  

17th July 1936 saw the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, an event which stirred emotion throughout Europe, no more so than in the village of Abercrave in the Swansea valley.  Abercrave was home to a community of Basques, who had fled the mining districts around Bilbao in Northern Spain in 1907 to look for work and to escape tyranny and persecution.  Over three decades they retained their national identity, language and customs, building permanent homes which to this day are known locally as Spanish Row. They had nevertheless assimilated with the Welsh community and were highly respected as craftsmen in the mining and steel works in the area.  At the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, the men of the entire  Basque community of Abercrave volunteered to join the International Brigade opposing the fascism of Franco, with many Welsh miners following suit.  Despite the British Government enforcing a complete ban on enlistment in Spain, the flow of volunteers continued.  It is estimated that up to 200 volunteers were from Wales; most from the mining areas and coal ports of the South. 

The song entitled 'If you tolerate this, your children will be next' by Welsh band  The Manic Street Preachers was inspired by the events of the Spanish Civil War.  The song is a tribute to the Welsh volunteers who joined the International Brigades to combat Francisco Franco's rebellion against the Spanish Republic. The song title echoes a Republican poster of the time, which depicts  a young child killed by the Nationalists under a sky filled with bombers. The poster carries the haunting  warning "If you tolerate this, your children will be next"   

Born on 17th July  1939 in Bon Y Maen, Swansea.

Spencer Davies - musician and founder of the 1960s rock band, The Spencer Davis Group.  Their best known songs include  "Somebody Help Me", "Keep on Running", "I'm a Man" and "Gimme Some Lovin"

  On this day, 2003 weapons expert David Kelly died at  Harrowdown Hill, Longworth, Oxfordshire.

 He appears to have gone directly to an area of woodlands known as Harrowdown Hill about a mile away from his home where he ingested up to 29 tablets of painkillers and to have then cut his left wrist with a knife he had owned since his youth.  His wife reported him missing shortly after midnight that night, and he was found early the next morning.

David Kelly was born in the Rhondda on 14 May 1944. He was a scientist and an acknowledged expert on biological warfare. He had been employed by the British Ministry of Defence and was a former United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq. He drew attention in July 2003 when he engaged in an unauthorised discussion  with BBC journalist Andrew Gilligan about the British government's information regarding 'weapons of mass destruction in Iraq' The conversation was revealed by Gilligan and led to a much-publicised controversy. Kelly's name was cited in the media as Gilligan's source, and on July 15th, he consequently appeared  before the parliamentary foreign affairs select committee investigating the issues outlined in Gilligan's report and was questioned  about his actions. His body was discovered two days later.

The Hutton Inquiry was set up, a public inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the death, which concluded that Kelly had committed suicide, a verdict that was challenged by many doctors, encouraging a conspiracy theory which implied that Dr Kelly had been silenced before further revelations on his behalf could embarrass the Government.  

On 17th July 2010, the Welsh language was used for the first time in a ceremony at Westminster Cathedral to honour the martyred saint John Roberts.

Dr Rowan Williams, who was Archbishop of Canterbury at that time, addressed the assembly in both Welsh and English.  The ceremony was part of a cluster of events to commemorate the 400th anniversary of John Roberts' martyrdom.  Roberts was a monk from Trawsfynydd in Gwynedd who was hanged, drawn and quartered in 1610 for being a Catholic dissenter, but was later canonised by Pope Paul VI in 1970.  The service in Westminster Cathedral was multi-faith and was attended by the leaders of all churches in Wales, along with the archbishops and bishops of Wales. There were also representatives from Douai in France where St John Roberts founded the monastery of St Gregory.   

On 17th July 1951 the Abbey Works steel plant at Margam, Port Talbot was opened. It is named after theCistercian Margam Abbey that used to be on the site - a small amount of the original building still stands (protected) within the site that survived the dissolution of the monasteries. Steelmaking at the Port Talbot complex began with the Margam Iron and Steel Works, completed between 1923 and 1926 and closed in 1953. After the Second World War, a group of south Wales steelmakers formed the Steel Company of Wales to erect a modern integrated steelmaking site using and subsequently the new Abbey Works was planned in 1947, was open in 1951 and was operating at full strength by 1953.

By the 1960s, the steelworks were the largest in Europe and the largest single employer in Wales, with a labour force of 18,000. In 1967, the company was nationalised and became a part of British Steel. By 2000, following privatisation, the works was part of Corus and then in 2010 it was announced that Corus was to be rebranded to the group name of Tata Steel.