The Radcliffe Line was announced on 17 August 1947 as a boundary demarcation line between India and Pakistan. 

The Indian Independence Act 1947,  stipulated that British Rule in India would come to an end and that the Provence of British India was to be partitioned into the independent nations of India and Pakistan. The Radcliffe Line was named after its architect, a Welshman,  Sir Cyril Radcliffe, from Llanychan, Denbighshire , who was given the chairmanship of the boundary committees, charged with producing a partition map, dividing the 175,000 square miles of territory and 88 million people.

The process had to be achieved within a month and was further hampered by the fact that Radcliffe had no previous knowledge of India.  The work was inevitably rushed and produced  instances where the border was drawn leaving some parts of a village in India and some in Pakistan and there were even instances where the dividing line passed through a single house with some rooms in one country and others in the other.  Then the Indian and Pakistani representatives were given only two hours to study copies, before its publication.  By his own admission, Radcliffe was heavily influenced by his lack of fitness for the Indian climate and his eagerness to depart India and justified the inaccuracies, saying  that no matter what he did, people would suffer.  However he destroyed all his papers before he left India.

Radcliffe had attempted to base the partition on religious demographics, but its implementation resulted in massive population exchanges between the two newly formed states in the months immediately following . It is estimated that 7.2 million Muslims went to Pakistan from India while  a further 7.2 million Sikhs and Hindus moved to India from Pakistan, to what they hoped was the relative safety of religious majority. About 11.2 million of the population transfer took place in the west, with Punjab accounting for most of it.  The newly formed governments were completely unequipped to deal with migrations of such staggering magnitude, and massive violence and slaughter occurred on both sides of the border.  It is estimated that 500,000 were killed. The violent nature of the partition created an atmosphere of mutual hostility and suspicion between India and Pakistan that plagues their relationship to this day.

After seeing the mayhem occurring on both sides of the boundary that was created by him, Radcliffe refused his salary of 40,000 rupees (then 3,000 pounds), but did accept a knighthood in 1948.

On 17 August 1911, Llanelli was the venue for the first ever national railway strike.

The strike was caused by compulsory overtime, poor wages and a 70 hour working week.  Talks between the union and management soon broke down and there was an immediate "walk out," by the Llanelli railway workers, which was joined by thousands of local tinplate workers.  All train traffic was then stopped by a 1,500 strong picket, placed at the station’s two railway crossings

Magistrates panicked and requested troops from the then home secretary Winston Churchill, who dispatched 700 of them to the town.  To control the crowd, a bayonet charge was ordered  against the unarmed workers, which resulted in one of crossings being cleared.

Then on the evening of Saturday 19th August a train, driven by strike breaking railwaymen,  was moved from the station until it was forced to stop by barricade of 250 strikers.  Another bayonet charge was ordered, which cleared the line.  However the crowd moved up onto the embankment and hurled stones at the military.  The Riot Act was read - the last time it has ever been read in mainland Britain and Major Stuart ordered the troops to open fire.  Two men were killed , one being the local rugby star,  John – Jac. The soldiers  then, moved back to the station to cries "Murderers" and the situation became increasingly more tense, with shops being looted and railway trucks attacked.  Tragically one of the trucks contained detonators and exploded, killing a further four people.

Sadly, what was not known at the time of the shootings, was that the strike had already been settled, with Churchill declaring "They have beaten us." 

Born on this day 1943 in Splott, Cardiff

John Humphrys  - author, Journalist and presenter of radio and television.  From 1981 to 1987 he was the main presenter for the BBC Nine O'Clock News and since 1987 he has been a presenter on the BBC Radio 4 news programme "Today" where he has a reputation as a tenacious and forthright interviewer. He is also currently the host of the BBC Two television quiz show Mastermind. Humphrys left school at 15 to become a teenage reporter on the Penarth Times , later joining the Western Mail.  He joined the BBC in 1966 and was soon sent to the United States and South Africa to start news bureaux.  In this role, he reported the resignation of Richard Nixon, the execution of Gary Gilmore and later, when based in South Africa, he covered the transformation of Rhodesia into Zimbabwe.  In 1981 he became the main presenter of the BBC's flagship Nine O'Clock News, but became frustrated with the endless meetings, working late and reading from an autocue, so in 1986 he immediately accepted a job on the "Today" programme 

Humphrys attracted controversy in September 2005 when he allegedly branded all politicians as liars and made comments about Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and John Prescott in an after-dinner speech which was subsequently leaked to The Times.  This resulted in him being censured by the Corporation for his use of "inappropriate and misguided" language.

He has won many industry awards, including being named Journalist of the Year in February 2000 and in 2005 he founded the Kitchen Table Charities Trust, a charity that funds projects to help some of the poorest people on the planet.

17th  August 1979 saw the release of the then controversial film "The Life of Brian" which was directed by Colwyn Bay born director Terry Jones and featured the Dinas Cross, Pembrokeshire  actress Sue Jones-Davies as the character Judith Iscariot.

The film tells of the life of Brian Cohen, who was born next door on the same day as Jesus Christ, and is mistaken for as the Messiah.  The film was controversial at the time, with some religious groups accusing it of being blasphemous.

Thirty-nine local authorities in the UK banned the film, as did some countries, such as Ireland and Norway.  However, the film makers used the notoriety to their advantage with advertising slogans such as "So funny it was banned in Norway!".

Interestingly, the ban was not lifted in Aberystwyth until 2009, when Sue Jones-Davies (who played Judith Iscariot) was elected mayor of the town.

On 17th August 1831, 93 people lost their lives when the paddle steamer Rothsay Castle was wrecked on Traeth Lafan (Lavan Sands) 0n the Menai Strait.

The steamer, which was used for day trips from Liverpool, along the coast of North Wales encountered a rough sea and strong winds and when one of the passengers went to ask  to return  to port, found  Captain Atkinson drunk and unwilling to turn the vessel around. By the time they had reached the Great Orme, the ship had taken on two feet of water and the pumps would not work.  To make matters worse, there was no bucket on board for bailing and the lifeboat, which had a hole in it, had no oars.  They ran aground and the ship broke up, with the bodies of the downed victims being washed up mostly on Anglesey.

The inquest that was held at Beaumaris concluded that the Rothsay Castle was not a seaworthy vessel and was not properly manned.  However, in 1832, as a result of the disaster, a lifeboat was stationed at Penmon and in 1837, the Trwyn Du (black nose) lighthouse was built.

The king of rock and roll, Elvis Presley died on 16th August 1977 and he may well have been of Welsh descent.

*  The name Presley is related to Preseli - the mountain range in Pembrokeshire.

*  Members of Elvis's family had Welsh names, his mother was named Gladys and his dead twin, Jesse Garon Presley had a Welsh middle name.

*  His maternal grandmother Doll Mansell may have come from the famous family of Mansel from Oxwich on the Gower peninsula. 

  In August 1405, Owain Glyndŵr held a parliament at Harlech Castle.  Glyndwr had taken control of Harlech Castle in 1404 and made it his home and headquarters.

 At the parliament of 1405, the Tripartite Indenture would have been discussed, which was the plan among Glyndwr, Thomas Percy, earl of Northumberland and Edmund Mortimer to divide England and Wales into three parts. 

*  Glyndŵr was to have control Wales, and the English portions of the Welsh Marches. 

* Northumberland was to have received the north of England.

*  Edmund Mortimer was to have received southern England.  

The former Welsh Rugby Union President, Sir Tasker Watkins, was awarded the Victoria Cross for action on 16th August 1944, which saw him mount an assault on a German machine-gun post in northern France.  After the war ended he took up law as a career and rose through the legal system to become deputy lord chief justice, acting as deputy to the attorney-general in the tribunal into the 1966 Aberfan disaster.  Sir Tasker became president of the WRU in 1993, overseeing the switch from the amateur era to professionalism and the move from club to regional rugby in Wales. He stepped down on 26 September 2004. 

Former Wales rugby coach Graham Henry had Watkins' citation pinned up on the wall of the Welsh changing room before international matches.  

Today is the feast day of Saint Armel.

The period following the collapse of Roman rule , which left the Celtic Britons to fend for themselves, saw the emerging Welsh kingdoms, continually wrestling with the Anglo Saxon kingdoms of Mercia, Northumbria and Wessex to define their frontiers as well as having to deal with opportunist Irish raiders   It was against this backdrop that many Celtic Britons left Britain and settled in the "Armorican" peninsula, later to be called Brittany. It was also at this time that many holy men, later commerated as saints, jorneyed between the Celtic countries, spreading the word of Christianity.  Armel is said to have been a Breton prince, born to the wife of King Hoel of Brittany while they were living in Glamorgan in the late 5th century.  He travelled from Wales to Brittany and founded several monasteries.

Legend has it that one day, a dangerous dragon appeared and began to prowl the district where the Welshman lived, attacking the inhabitants.  Armel could no longer bear to witness the ravages of the monster, so he decided to meet the beast in its cave.  Using sacred water, he lured the dragon out, whereupon it became as meek as a lamb.  Tying a scarf  around the neck of the monster, Armel led the dragon to the top of a mountain, from where he ordered it to jump to its death. To commemorate this event, the mountain was dubbed Mont-Saint-Armel.

The memory of Saint Armel  as well as many other saints was kept alive by the pilgrimage cult that produced pilgrim badges in his honor.  The use of pilgrim badges flourished in Europe during the 14th and 15th centuries.  

Born on this day 1888 in Tremadog, Caernarfonshire

Thomas Edward Lawrence, who later became known as "Lawrence of Arabia"

Lawrence gained fame as a leader of an Arab revolt against the Ottoman Empire during World War One.  He had thrown himself into Arabic culture to befriend and sympathise with his Arab partners and it was this ability to identify with the Arab peoples which made him a successful military leader.

In August 1284, following the deaths of Llywelyn and Dafydd ap Gruffyd, King Edward I of England held court in the Welsh llys (royal court) at Abergwyngregyn.

The area first enters the history books in AD 60, when Suetonius Paulinus led twenty-five thousand men from their base on the bank of the river Dee to invade Anglesey, which was then the stronghold of the druids. The Roman soldiers forded the sands at this point and Tacitus later recorded the savage massacre of the local people that took place. The road that the Romans built linking Chester to Segontium (Caernarfon) looped round the garth.

The original name of the settlement was Garth Celyn and is positioned on a raised promontory of land on the fringe of Snowdonia, overlooking the Irish Sea with wide sweeping views across the Menai Strait to Anglesey and beyond. To the east of the Llys was the Cistercian Monastery of Aberconwy and to the west the cathedral city of Bangor.

About the year 1200, Prince Llywelyn ap Iorwerth made it his home as did his grandson Llywelyn ap Gruffydd. It is Garth Celyn that John Peckham, Archbishop of Canterbury, travelled to in November 1282 to negotiate between Llywelyn and Edward. Llywelyn was offered a bribe - £1000 a year and an estate in England if he would surrender the Welsh Nation into the hands of the King. His refusal and his reasons for doing so, were dated from ‘Garth Kelyn’.

After the Anglo Norman Conquest, the name Garth Celyn continued in local use but was not used by the English administration. Instead the settlement Aber Garth Celyn adjacent to the royal home became officially known by the administrators simply as Aber, ‘Estuary’ with its identity removed and later replaced with Abergwyngregyn, ‘Estuary of the White Shells’. The Welsh royal home was occupied and became a Crown of England property: Edward and his entourage stayed there in 1283 and again in 1284, but from that time on no member of the English royal family again set foot on it and it gradually fell into ruin.

The 15th August is celebrated as V-J Day (Victory over Japan Day) the day in 1945 that Japan surrendered, effectively ending World War II.  However, the campaign to push the Japanese out of Burma was the longest and bloodiest of World War II.  This is emphasised by the following orders that were given to the Japanese soldiers.

'Continue in the task till all your ammunition is expended. If your hands are broken, fight with your feet. If your hands and feet are broken, fight with your teeth. If there is no breath left in your body, fight with your spirit. Lack of weapons is no excuse for defeat.'

Japan had long resented the British presence in the Far East and with Hitler  certain of victory in late 1941, they invaded Malaya and Burma to seize raw materials such as rubber and oil.  British staff officers ridiculed the idea that the Japanese could be a serious fighting force.and would be no match for a modern European army. Then came the brutally effective Japanese attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbour, on December 7, 1941.   Japanese bombers were in action again three days later, sinking the battleship “The Prince Of Wales” and the battle-cruiser Repulse in the South China Sea with the loss of about 1,000 men.  The news reverberated around the world and was followed almost immediately with humiliating news that Singapore had surrendered, which was followed by two and a half years of disaster and defeat for the British Army, as it retreated northwards through Burma in the face of a terrifying enemy.   The Japanese completed their advance through Burma by late May 1942 and virtually all the remaining Allied troops had retreated north over the Indian border.

However, in the end, Japanese industrial capacity simply could not sustain a long war and when Germany surrendered, the Allies were able to release all of their weaponry for the war in South-East Asia, which in August 1945, culminated with the devastating strikes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 

Born on this day 1856 in Holyton, near Motherwell, Scotland 

Kier Hardie, who was one of the Labour Party's founders and its first leader.   He became the MP for Merthyr Tydfil and Aberdare  on 2nd October and was one of the two initial Labour Party MP's to sit in The Houses of Parliament.

Hardie came from a poor household and although he had no formal education, his parents taught him to read and write.  He began to work in the local coal mines and being a devout evangelical Christian and a supporter of  the temperance movement, he became skilled at public speaking. This then led to him becoming a spokesman for his colleagues in their disputes with management. However, this led to him being seen as an agitator and he was blacklisted by the management.  Hardie therefore began to work for the miners' union and this led to him being involved in many of the strikes of that time. He and his wife Lillie also ran a soup kitchen from their own home.

Originally a Liberal, Hardie  soon became disillusioned by the party's lack of emphasis on helping the working man and began to stand for parliament as an independent, being elected in 1892 as an MP for West Ham South in.  Then in 1893 he formed and became leader of the Independent Labour Party

In 1894 251 miners were killed after an explosion at a mine in Pontypridd and after his request for a message of condolence to be sent to the families of the berieved was refused  by parliament and a message of congratulation to Buckingham Palace on the birth of the future Edward VIII agreed, Hardie delivered a vitriolic attack on the monarchy, which resulted in him losing his seat at the next election in 1895.

Hardie spent the next five years laying the foundations of the future Labour Party and returned to parliament in 1900 as an MP for the Labour Representation Party, which in 1906 changed its name to the Labour Party, with Hardie becoming its first leader.

Hardie, a firm pacifist during World War One, battled all his life for the oppressed and under-privileged.  He was a supporter of female emancipation, home rule for India and the ending of segregation in South Africa.  However in 1915, worn out by his help for others, Hardie suffered a series of strokes and died. He was buried in his native Glasgow but has never been forgotten in Merthyr and Aberdare where he is still revered as Britain's first truly socialist MP.

Born on this day 1908 in Swansea

Wynford Vaughan-Thomas  CBE - newspaper journalist and radio and television broadcaster.

Picture is of a memorial to Wynford Vaugan Thomas, in Welsh slate on the slopes of Moel Fadian, one of his favourite locations, near the village of Aberhosan in Powys.  It highlights all 13 peaks in Wales above 3,000ft .

Thomas's mother Morfydd Lewis, was the daughter of Daniel Lewis who was one of the leaders of the Rebecca riots in Pontardulais.  He Was a contemporary  of Dylan Thomas at the Bishop Gore School, Swansea,before graduating from Oxford.  Thomas then joined the BBC and in 1937 gave the Welsh-language commentary on the Coronation of King George VI and during World War II, he established his name and reputation as one of the BBC's most distinguished war correspondants.  His most memorable report was from an RAF Lancaster bomber during a real bombing raid over Nazi Berlin. Other notable reports were from Lord Haw Haw's broadcasting studio and the Belsen concentration camp. Then in 1953 he was one of a team of BBC commentators on the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II.

In 1967, after leaving the BBC, he was one of the founders of Harlech TV, now ITV Wales, being appointed Director of Programmes, as a frequent TV broadcaster himself throughout his early career with the BBC he had adopted the required BBC accent of the time but employed his more natural native Welsh accent to even better effect in his later career. In May 1970, when President of the Council for the Protection of Rural Wales, he officially opened the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path.

Born this day 1951 in Tredegar

Berwyn Price -  former  Welsh  international athlete (110 metre hurdles).  Price was a double Olympian and won the gold medal at the 1978 Commonwealth Games.  He later became Head of Sports Tourism for Swansea and Assistant Director of Leisure for Swansea City Council.

The Black Death arrived in Wales in early 1349, probably carried from southern England, and by mid-August it was rife, wiping out approximately 25% of the population. 

The  subsequent social changes following the Black Death were as profound in Wales, as other parts of Britain, with fewer people being available to work the land and influence of the Church suffering due to in part, the decrease in the number of monks.   

On August 14th 1979, the longest lasting rainbow in meteorological history, was recorded over on the Gwynedd coast in North Wales, lasting for 3 hours.     

On 14th August 1834, the Poor Law Amendment Act was introduced in England and Wales.

The act introduced Poor Law Unions, of which there were 583 in England and Wales by 1839.  The unions were made up by combining parishes and each union was responsible for providing a workhouse for the accommodation of those unable to support themselves financially.  However, people dreaded being forced to enter the workhouse, as living conditions were often appalling and families separated on entry.  .

They were often the subject of protest, such as the workhouse at Carmarthen, which was attacked by the 'Rebecca Rioters' in 1843 as part of their campaign of protests across south-west Wales.  

Richard Parks (born 14th August 1977 in Pontypridd) is a former Wales rugby union international, who was forced to retire from playing due to a shoulder injury.

Parks then took up mountain climbing to raise money for charity and notably in 2011, set a new record for the 737 challenge.  That is to climb the highest peak in each of 7 continents of the world, as well as the North Pole, the South Pole and Everest.  

On 14 August 1884,  construction of the dock at Barry Island was authorised, following the passing of.the Barry Dock and Railway Company Act.

Suffering from the restrictions on capacity and the monopoly of the coal transporting market between The Taff Vale Railway and Cardiff Docks, a group of mine owners, led by David Davies, chairman of the Ocean Merthyr company proposed the development of an alternative route running to new docks at Barry.  The venture proved to be a success and by 1910, Barry was exporting more coal than its competitor at Cardiff.

However, the subsequent decline in production of  South Wales coal, following the First World War, resulted in Barry Docks becoming better known as the centre for the scrapping of British Railways steam locomotives.

Brian Nancurvis (14 August 1937 9 January 2012), who fought under the name Brian Curvis as a professional, was a boxer from Swansea, who was active from 1959 to 1966. He fought as a Welterweight, becoming British welterweight champion in 1960. He retired as undefeated champion and is the only welterweight to have won two Lonsdale Belts outright. The four defeats in his professional career were all to foreign boxers; he was never beaten by a British boxer

On June 3, 1831, he was involved in the Merthyr Rising, which was one of many protests throughout industrial Wales at the time against the terrible working conditions in the mines and ironworks,  made  worse by wage cuts and the layoffs as demand for iron and coal fell away.  A mob ransacked the building  where court records of debt were being stored and in a bid to restore order, a detachment from one of the Highland Regiments stationed at Brecon, fired into the unarmed crowd, killing 16 people.  No soldiers were killed in the affray, but one, a Private Donald Black was stabbed in the leg with a bayonet.  Along with his cousin Lewis Lewis, Dic Penderyn was arrested for the attack even though neither man could be identified as carrying it out.  Even though it is thought that Dic had had  limited involvement  in the rising, both he and his cousin were convicted, sentenced to death, however, Lewis Lewis later had his sentence commuted to transportation. 

The people of Merthyr Tydfil were convinced that Dic Penderyn was not guilty and raised a petition demanding his release that was signed by over 11,000.  However, the Home Secretary Lord Melbourne, well known for his severity, refused to reduce the sentence and Dic Penderyn was duly hanged.  Thousands grieved and lined the route as Dic's coffin was taken from Cardiff to Aberavon where he was buried  in St Mary's churchyard, Port Talbot.  

Dic's death embittered relations between Welsh workers and the authorities and strengthened the Trade Union movement and Chartism in the run up to the Newport Rising.  He became a working class hero, a folk hero, who through his death became a symbol for those who tried to fight and resist oppression.  

"The man who knew too much" - (Photographs courtesy of Nigel Linsan Colley - www.garethjones.org) 

Gareth Richard Vaughan Jones (born in Barry on 13th August 1905) -  "unsung hero of Ukraine"  a journalist who first publicised the existence of the Great Ukranian Famine of 1932-33 (the Holodomor) to the Western World. 

His mother had been tutor to the grandchildren of the Welsh steel industrialist John Hughes, who was the founder of the town of  Hughesovka , modern day Donetsk in Ukraine and her stories inspired in Jones a desire to visit the Soviet Union and particularly Ukraine.  

In January 1930, he began work as Foreign Affairs Advisor to David Lloyd George, before touring the Soviet Union in the summer of 1931 with H.J. Heinz of the food company dynasty.  In  1932,  Jones returned to work for Lloyd George and helped the wartime Prime Minister write his  War Memoirs .  

In 1933, Jones covered the coming into power of the Nazi Party in Germany and later he flew with Hitler to report on his tumultuous acclamation in Frankfurt. he then travelled to Russia and Ukraine, after which he issued his now famous press release, with the heading.  'There is no bread. We are dying'.  Going on to report how many houses were full of dead and dying people and how those who were alive, were living on cattle fodder. 

This report was unpopular, as many in the media were sympathetic with the Soviet regime and denied the existence of a famine.  Jones was subsequently  banned from  visiting the Soviet Union again and turned his attention to the Far East, to where he toured in late 1934.  In  Japan,  he was captured by bandits and shot dead in mysterious circumstances. There were strong suspicions that Jones had been murdered by the Soviet secret police as a reprisal for the embarrassment he had previously caused the Soviet regime.  

In 2006, a trilingual (Welsh/English/Ukrainian) plaque was unveiled in Gareth Jones' memory in the Old College at Aberystwyth University and in 2008, Jones and fellow Holodomor journalist Malcolm Muggeridge were posthumously awarded the Ukranian Order of Merit in reward for their exceptional services to the country and its people.

Howard Marks - author and former drug  smuggler , who achieved notoriety as an international cannabis smuggler.  At his  peak,  he was supposedly smuggling up to 30  tons  of the drug at a time and was connected with the CIA, MI6, IRA and the Mafia.  He was finally convicted by the American Drug Enforcement Administration and handed a 25-year  sentence,  though he was released in April 1995 after serving seven.  Marks was nicknamed Mr Nice, after a passport that he acquired belonging to convicted murderer Donald Nice, one of  43  different aliases he is thought to have used. 

Noah Ablett, born in 1883 in Porth, Rhondda was a trade unionist and political theorist. He had originally intended to join the ministry but turned his attention to the plight of the poor pay and working conditions of the coal miners in Rhondda.  After winning a scholarship to Ruskin College, Oxford in 1907, he was part of the college strike and subsequent movement that saw the creation of the Plebs' League, a Marxist educational group.  

On returning to Wales, Ablett became a checkweighman at Mardy Colliery and set up Marxist educational classes. He was also one of the founders of the Unofficial Reform Committee and the main author of 'The Miners' Next Step', which demanded a minimum wage for miners and for control of the mines to be handed to the workers. Between 1921 and 1926 he was an executive member of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain.

  'A Gossiping Guide to Wales' by Mr Askew Roberts, was published in  "The Spectator" on 12th August 1871. 

 It was a record of his travels to places in Wales such as Snowdon, Cader Idris and the Wye Valley and it recommended long weeks of leisurely travel for Victorian tourists, to appreciate the true beauty of Wales .    

On August 12th 1896, gold was discovered in a tributary of the Klondike river in Canada.  Subsequent large quantities found all along the river, triggered a gold rush, which attracted around 40,000 people from all parts of the world, including Wales, from 1897 until 1898.

The celebrity writer Jack London, whose grandmother, Eleanor Garrat Jones, was Welsh, was among those who joined the rush and the hardships he endured there, which left him malnourished and with constant pain in his legs, were to inspire his short story "To Build a Fire", which many critics regard as his best work.  

 On 12th August 1399, King Richard II was taken prisoner by Henry Percy at Conwy Castle, during negotiations to give up his crown.  He later surrendered to the future King Henry IV at Flint Castle, prior to his death at Pontefract Castle in February 1400. 

Ann Griffiths,  poet and hymn writer was buried on this day in 1805 aged 29 years.   

Ann Griffiths was a Calvinist Methodist hymn writer who lived the majority of her life in Dolanog. She was born in 1776, on a farm called Dolwar Fach and christened in the parish church of Llanfihangel-yng-Ngwynfa.  

In 1794, her mother died, and she helped to run the farm with her father and brother John until her father’s death in 1804. In October of the same year she married Thomas Griffiths, who came to live at Dolwar Fach, but ten months later, she died following the death of her baby daughter, Elizabeth.

Ann is buried at Llanfihangel-yng-Ngwynfa church, where, in 1864 a memorial to her was erected  by her great nephew.  

Ann was brought up as a member of the Anglican church of St Michael’s at Llanfihangel-yng-Ngwynfa, but like many of her family, she was increasingly involved in nonconformist worship. Dolwar Fach, their home, was registered as a religious meeting house and received many visiting preachers and teachers such as John Hughes (who later went on to start the chapel at Pontrobert). Pendref Chapel in Llanfyllin was a link in the chain of events that led to her conversion: in 1795 she heard an open air preacher outside Pendref Chapel when attending the local fair. During the 1790s, all her family became Calvinistic Methodists. Ann’s spiritual experiences were considered remarkable even at a time of powerful religious awakening. She began to write them down in the form of poems, which were later sung as hymns.  

           

St David's College (now the University of Wales, Lampeter) was founded by Thomas Burgess, Bishop of St David's on 12th August 1822.

The college was the oldest degree awarding institution in Wales and was the third oldest in England and Wales after Oxford and Cambridge. It merged with Trinity University College (under its 1822 charter) in 2010, to create the University of Wales, Trinity Saint David.

When Thomas Burgess was appointed Bishop of St David's in 1803, he recognised the need for a Welsh college for trainee ministers to receive a higher education. It was Burgess's intention to build the college in Llanddewi Brefi which has a rich history in the Christianity of Wales. However he decided on Lampeter after being given three acres,

where the Norman castle once stood in Lampeter, by the Gloucestershire landowner, John Scandrett Harford.
It remained a centre of clerical training until 1978, but also, the 1896 charter specifically stated that the college could accept anyone, regardless of whether they intended to take Holy Orders or not.

On 12th August 1912, chemists Humphrey Owen Jones and Muriel Gwendolen Edwards were killed on their honeymoon in Switzerland. While climbing in the Alps, their guide slipped and fell on Jones and all three dropped nearly 1,000 feet to their death. The north summit of the Aiguille Blanche de Peuterey was named La Pointe Jones in their honour

Humphrey Owen Jones from Goginan, Cardiganshire was one of the most productive British chemists of his day and published more than 60 papers between 1900 and 1912 and Muriel Gwendolen Edwards was the first woman to be elected a Fellow of the University of Wales.
In 1907, Jones became a keen climber and after receiving some tuition in Snowdonia, he went on to pioneer some of the region's most difficult climbs. He was also part of the first ascent of the Brouillard ridge to the summit of Mont Blanc and member of both the Committee of the Climbers’ Club and the Alpine Club.  

  Born on 12th August 1905 in Margam

Llewellyn Heycock, Baron Heycock CBE (12 August 1905 – 13 March 1990) -  local politician and life peer. 

Heycock  began his working career as an engine driver with the Great Western Railway, where he became an active trade unionist and a member of the Labour Party.  He later became Chairman of the Glamorganshire Education Committee, despite having received little formal education himself.  

Born on this day 1869 in Pontnewydd, Monmouthshire

Frederick 'Fred' Charles Parfitt - former Welsh international scrum-half, who also represented Wales at bowls.

On 11th August 2008, a re-survey of Mynydd Graig Goch in the Moel Hebog group of Snowdonia summits determined its height to be 2,000ft 6in  rather than the 1998ft previously recorded, therefore, qualifying it as a mountain.

The Normans occupied Glamorgan early after the Norman Conquest and on 11 August 1107, under the instruction of King Henry I, Archbishop Anselm of Canterbury consecrated  Urban as the first purely Norman bishop of the church of Glamorgan, which sometime between 1115 and 1119, was re-named the diocese of Llandaff.  Before Urban,  the bishops were called Bishop of Teilo, although still ministering to Glamorgan and Gwent and were almost certainly based at Llandeilo Abbey.    

 Urban made great efforts to increase the prestige of Llandaff.  He translated the relics of  St Dyfrig from Bardsey Island and reburied them at Llandaff.  Then in April 1120, he began the reconstruction of the existing small church into a cathedral.    

But perhaps his most notable legacy is the compilation of the "Book of Llandaff" a dossier of documents begun in 1119' by which he hoped to increase the lands and properties held by the diocese at the expense of the neighbouring dioceses of Hereford and St Davids.  The case was referred to Rome and Urban travelled there in April 1128, where Pope Honorius II (pictured) decided provisionally in his favour awarding substantial swathes of territory in Herefordshire and Deheubarth to the Llandaff diocese.  In 1130, the bishop of St Davids  appealed the decision and Pope Innocent II reversed the judgement.  Urban died in early October 1134 during his final visit to Rome.  

Though he lost, Urban's epic legal battle in which he displayed ambition and energy radically changed the nature of the relationship between the papal curia and the church in England and there was to be an increasing number of litigants who appealed to Rome following decisions taken in provincial courts.   

Alun Hoddinott CBE - composer of classical music, who, more than anyone, directed classical music's postwar path to full professionalism and creative renewal.  

A fitting recognition was the announcement that the new home of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales at the Wales Millennium Centre is to be named BBC Hoddinott Hall - Neuadd Hoddinott y BBC.   Hoddinott was a violinist,  child-prodigy   and a  founding member  of the National Youth Orchestra of Wales at age 16.  Over the course of his  career,  his vast and versatile catalogue runs to nearly 300 individual works, which include 10 symphonies, 6 operas and over 20 concertos.  

Born on this day 1941 in Rhyl 

Nerys Hughes - actress, known primarily for her television roles, in "The Liver Birds"   and "The District Nurse", for which she won the Television Actress of the Year Award.   

Born on this day 1923, from Mold.

Raymond Davies-Hughes - The  Welshman who broadcasted  propaganda  in Welsh for the Germans during World War II.

Hughes was an RAF airman whose plane was shot down over Germany during a bombing raid and when approached in a prisoner-of-war camp, Hughes agreed to broadcast propaganda in Welsh. Joseph Goebbels was the Third Reich's Propaganda Minister and he realised the importance and influence of mass media. He knew that a Welsh speaker could reach a new audience. Hughes worked with the traitor William Joyce, better known as "Lord Haw-Haw", who broadcasted propaganda programmes in English for the Nazis. After the war, Lord Haw-Haw was hanged for treason while Hughes was sentenced to five years hard labour, which was subsequently reduced to two years following an appeal for clemency.

On this day 1952, Dylan Thomas made his first and only TV appearance for the BBC reading his story "The Outing", footage of  which has never been recovered.   

"The Outing" follows the adventures of a group of old men and a young boy on a charabanc pub crawl to Porthcawl which - due to the effects of alcohol - they never reach. 

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On this day 1405, the town of Haverfordwest was burned by a force of Henry VI  of France, who were allies at the time of Owain Glyndwr.  

A Short History of Haverfordwest;    Haverfordwest is the county town of Pembrokeshire, with an approximate population of 13,500, it is a major "road hub", connecting West Wales with the M4 South Wales corridor and it is Pembrokeshire's principal commercial and retail centre, there having been significant retail development recently in the suburb of Withybush.  

There are two competing explanations for the name of the town, either "ford used by fat cows" from Old English  hæfar =heifer, fat cows, or that during the Tudor Period monarchs called it "Hereford or Hertford in the West".

There is no documentary evidence of a settlement on the site before the 12th century, but archaeological discoveries suggest that the Romans did occupy the area and it seems unlikely that Haverfordwest, with its obvious strategic advantages of a defensive bluff overlooking the lowest fordable point on the Western Cleddau and its accessibility to sea traffic, would not have been settled in some way.  

1100  - Haverfordwest Castle is recorded as having been founded by the Norman Gilbert de Chuv.  

1107, 1111 and 1151  -   The Flemish are said to have arrived in three groups, initially mercenaries in the invading army of William the Conqueror, who were granted lands in the Gower and Pembrokeshire as a reward.  The Flemings were reportedly unpopular and are recorded as extinct in Pembrokeshire by 1327 but Flemish mercenaries reappear in 1400 when at the behest of Henry IV they joined an army of 1500 English settlers who marched north from Pembrokeshire to attack the army of Owain Glyndwr at Mynydd Hyddgen.  

1213 - 1219  -  Haverfordwest was the centre for significant woollen cloth manufacture and received its first marcher charter from William Marshall, 1st Earl of Pembroke, it also obtained the lucrative trading privileges of an English borough. 

1220  - Llywelyn ap Iorwerth ( Llywelyn the Great), Prince of Gwynedd threatened the Marshal and burned the town but failed to take the castle.  

1284  -  King Edward I and Queen Eleanor of Castile visited the castle for the first time during a royal pilgrimage to St Davids. Eleanor was said to have fallen in love with the castle and purchased it four years later. 

1348  - In common with other large towns, Haverfordwest was affected by the Black Death, with large parts of the town abandoned,  

1359-67  -  Edward, the Black Prince occupied the castle. 

1405  - The town was burned by the French allies of Owen Glendower,  

1479  - The town was designated a county corporate, in order to support a campaign against piracy in local waters and remained officially "The Town and County of Haverfordwest" until the abolition of the borough in 1974.  

1642  - During the English Civil War, the borough supported Parliament, whilst the gentry supported the Royalists.  This led to the town changing hands five times during the conflict. 1648  - Oliver Cromwell  ordered the castle to be destroyed and threatened to imprison the townsfolk unless it was demolished   1779  - The derelict medieval castle was converted to a prison    1820  - A new prison building was erected within the castle grounds, which today houses the Pembrokeshire Record Office. 

1940  Haverfordwest was bombed during WW2.  It was unexpected and no warning siren sounded. There were no reported casualties.

Born this day 1946 in The Vale of Glamorgan.   

Peter Karrie - singer , best known for his portrayal of the lead role in the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, The Phantom of the Opera.  He was twice voted the favourite Phantom of members of The Phantom of the Opera Appreciation Society. He has also starred in many other West End musical productions, including Les Miserables and Chess.  Karrie has had his own television and radio shows on BBC Wales.   

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On this day 2008 Nicole Cooke claimed Britain's first gold medal of the Beijing Olympics  becoming the first Welsh person to win Olympic gold for 36 years. 

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Born this day 1930 in Newport

Derrick Sullivan - former Welsh soccer international, who was part of the Wales squad for the 1958 FIFA World Cup in Sweeden.