Category: General Interest Articles

DISCOVERING ST DONAT’S

St Donat’s Castle is an intriguing place and there are plenty of opportunities to tour and visit. The site has a proud history from its use as an Iron Age fortress, home of the Celtic Chieftain Caradog, to its purchase and development by the American newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst.

As home to the world-renowned Atlantic College, alumni include our First Minister, Eluned Morgan and a host of other notables, even recently including none other than Princess Leonor, the crown princess of Spain.

Bernard Shaw described the castle after Hearst’s reconstruction as ‘what God would have built if he had had the money’. Hearst rarely visited St Donats. When he did, he often took his large entourage for drinks to the Old Swan Inn, Llantwit Major. Among his guests were the actors Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, Errol Flynn and Clark Gable, in addition to politicians including Winston Churchill, David Lloyd George and a young John F. Kennedy, who visited with his parents.

Hearst was a colourful character who attracted strong opinions. President Theodore Roosevelt called him “an unspeakable blackguard with all the worst faults of the corrupt and dissolute monied man”. Winston Churchill, who stayed as Hearst’s guest at St Donat’s described him as ‘a grave simple child – with no doubt a nasty temper – playing with the most costly toys… two magnificent establishments, two charming wives (a reference to Hearst’s affair with Hollywood star Marion Davies a regular visitor to St Donat’s), complete indifference to public opinion’.

Hearst loved to put on a show. His Fourth of July celebrations in 1934 for example, included a fireworks display of such scale and extravagance that the coastguard complained it was confusing shipping in the Bristol Channel. Whether Hurst would have approved of these opportunities for all of us to get up close and personal with St Donat’s we’ll never know.

In term time you can enjoy a visit to one of the monthly Café Concerts held at UWC Atlantic Art Centre.

Performed by international students, you can enjoy a range of classical productions and in turn support them in developing their public performing skills, as they prepare for exam recitals. Concerts typically last for around 45 minutes and include a serving of tea, coffee and a biscuit – all included in the ticket price. Any profits go towards the UWC Atlantic educational charity. The cost is £6.29.

A good way to explore the history of the castle is to join a private guided tour. Tours take 90 minutes and including Afternoon Tea, cost £32.95 per person. The Afternoon Tea of sandwiches, cakes and refreshments is served in either the Dining Hall or Glassroom. You will hear more about the 19th century restoration by coal magnate Morgan Stuart Williams but it is likely to be the tales about the development of St Donats under the eccentric ownership of Randolph Hearst, which will be the most captivating.

The two-day Christmas Fayre, will be held on Saturday 30th November and Sunday 1st December. Over 70 local food, drink and craft traders will be exhibiting, and you can also take the opportunity to wander in the 12th century castle, arts centre and gardens. The event starts at 10.00 am and closes at 4.00pm and costs £13 per car and £3 on foot. Parking is on fields or in areas on campus a short walk from the castle so appropriate footwear is advised.

ALL ABOUT CRIMESTOPPERS

What’s On regularly provides a short update on crime in the village. Fortunately Wenvoe crime data, which can be found on the police statistics website, reveals that we have a relatively low crime rate. Occasionally however we may find it necessary to report local crime. Contact details for the local police, including the Wenvoe PCSO, Dave Chadock can be found on page 2, along  with information about Crimestoppers. Although most people have heard of Crimestoppers,  many know little about it.

Crimestoppers provides an opportunity for people to report crimes anony￾mously and these reports are then passed on to the police. It is important  to note that Crimestoppers is not the police but an independent charity  working to help communities. You can contact Crimestoppers to report  crimes with a free telephone call (0800 555 111) or by completing an  online form. If the information you give leads to an arrest, or is of signifi￾cant use, you may be eligible to claim a cash reward of up to £1,000. The  Crimestoppers national website provides more information.

The key to the success of Crimestoppers is that you can report crimes with confidence that your report  will remain anonymous. Indeed it’s rare for Crimestoppers to trumpet its successes because it can’t risk  compromising the guarantee of anonymity that it provides to everyone who gets in contact. No records  are kept of the personal details, phone numbers or computer IP addresses of anyone who makes contact.

As Crimestoppers is not the police there are some things that the organisation cannot process. These  include fly-tipping, scam e-mails or phone calls, noise complaints, benefit fraud, dumped or untaxed  vehicles, minor driving offences or missing people. The website provides advice on what to do in  these circumstances.

Crimestoppers has been a huge success. Since it began in 1988, it has received more than 2.2 million  actionable calls, resulting in more than 150,000 arrests and charges, more than £140 million worth of  stolen goods recovered and more than £367 million worth of illegal drugs seized. Between April 2022  and March 2023, Crimestoppers sent police forces over 196,000 anonymous crime reports – that’s 537  per day and 22 per hour. Some 60% of the reports sent to police forces are drugs-related. Typically,  they’re sightings of dealers in cars or on street corners, details of cannabis factories, or intelligence  about so-called county lines networks – the city-based gangs that supply drugs to rural areas and sea￾side towns. Crimestoppers also has a Most Wanted UK-wide gallery with images, which since 2005  has resulted in more than 5,000 arrests.

Crimestoppers actually began in Alburquerque, New Mexico in 1976. Its UK origins appear to have  been linked to the October 1985 London riots. When PC Keith Blakelock was murdered at the Broad￾water Farm Estate, the police appealed for information, stating that people knew who had been re￾sponsible but were frightened of coming forward. This according to the UK website, led in January  1988, to the founding of the Community Action Trust (CAT), by Michael (later Lord) Ashcroft and  business partners. The CAT was a phone line where people called and anonymously provided infor￾mation about crime, which was then forwarded to the police. By 1995 it was re-named Crimestoppers  Trust and expanded to the whole of the UK.

There is also however a counter claim that Crimestoppers originated in the town of Great Yarmouth in  1983. Mike Cole, then a Detective Inspector with the Norfolk Constabulary, got the idea from a police  visit to the US. Inspired by what was happening in the US, Crimestoppers was set up in the town, with  the agreement of the police, financial support from the town’s Woolworth store and publicity from the  local Yarmouth Mercury newspaper. Crimestoppers encouraged people to pass information to police  anonymously without fear of reprisal. Informants called a dedicated telephone number at Great Yar￾mouth Police Station. A reward was handed out in brown envelopes for information received, often in  dark alleys.

THE VALE FOODBANK

As people continue to suffer with the cost of living many continue to turn to the Foodbank for help. This help is for those who find themselves in emergencies whether they are working or in receipt of benefits. As time progresses and numbers of these seeking help has increased the donations now are stretched to fulfil what is needed. Below are examples of what can help. Alternatively, money can be donated which is used to buy items that run out. As the school holidays begin the demands are expected to rise as children will not have access to school meals

Here in Wenvoe I feel privileged to deliver our donations each Thursday to the Warehouse in Barry, who in turn services all Foodbank outlets in the Vale. I am pleased to take a car boot full each week and also money people have donated. However, I am aware each week of the depleted stock, and hear the volunteers concerns about the difficulties they are now experiencing.

If you would like to donate there is a box in the church porch which is emptied regularly to ensure the security of the goods. Alternatively if you have any queries please contact me Jude Billingham on 07516112897.

Ideas for donations:

Tinned meat for hot meals or sandwiches

Tinned vegetables and potatoes

Fruit juice or squash

Tinned fruit

Breakfast cereals

Long life milk

Pasta sauce

Tinned tomatoes

Treats: eg. crisps or biscuits

Toiletries including women’s essentials

Coffee, tea

THE CAPE HORNERS OF COPPEROPOLIS

For many years on the approach to Swansea along Fabian Way, there stood a dilapidated pub with a sign depicting a square rigged sailing ship and the name “The Cape Horner”. The name links to Cape Horn being the tip of south America (Tierra del Fuego) that juts into the south Atlantic and surely some of the most mountainous and stormy seas on the planet.

In nautical history, Cape Horners were sailing ships that plied their trade through those waters to carry copper ore from the Chilean port of Valparasio to the smelting furnaces of Copperopolis (after having first taken a cargo of Welsh coal to South America). Such vessels and their intrepid crews would have taken more than a year to make the journey from Swansea to Chile and back.

What follows is based on an article from the Swansea Museum entitled “The Dangers of Sailing”

At the other end of the world to us, Cape Horn is a desolate and fearsome place, the most dangerous part of a voyage to bring Copper ore to Swansea. Bitter winds blow ceaselessly from west to east, and massive green waves up to thirty metres high roll across the ocean, so strong they can smash a ship to pieces, in storms that rage all winter long. The men who sailed those seas were the toughest and most skilled seamen. Their life was hard, but their pride and fellowship were great. It was the Copper trade with Chile – the terrible journey round Cape Horn, and the perils of the voyage home – which made Swansea’s ships and sailors famous. To be called a Cape Horner was the highest accolade a seaman could earn. Few ports had more Cape Horners than Swansea in those days

It was a dangerous, harsh and harrowing life. Men who survived it were tough, rugged, and brave. It could take many weeks to sail round the Horn as the trepid sailors incrementally tacked their vessels into the face of raging stormy seas to make westward progress. The whole voyage, from Swansea to Chile and back again typically took a year or more. Crammed into the dark, dank forecastle, or crews’ quarters aboard ship, fifteen or more men slept in wooden bunks with mattresses filled with straw. In rough weather everything got wet and it was a place for

A long hard battle with the elements. As the copper trade ships drew near to Cape Horn from the Atlantic Ocean the crew prepared for the battle ahead. The ship had to be in prime condition to survive the vicious wind and waves. They would check the sails for tears and damage, and the rigging for frayed or broken ropes.

Round the Horn with icy sails and rigging. Sailors, working high in the rigging, would have clung for their very lives to ice-covered sails and ropes with frozen hands, battered by wind and waves. Terrible accidents happened. Men fell into the sea, or onto the deck far below, and massive waves could wash them overboard, and snap ships’ masts like matchsticks. Other hazards lurked, such as thick fogs that came drifting off the land and blocked out sight and sound. The rocks around that wild coastline, and worse still, icebergs, could sink a ship and drown its crew. Winter was the worst time to make the voyage. Summer weather was not so bad, with lighter, warmer wind, more gentle waves, and then the sailors could see the wild beauty of the Cape Horn coastline.

The living was rough. Fresh food did not last long. For most of the voyage, all the men could eat was salted meat, ships biscuits, dried beans, potatoes, onions and maybe fish, if they had time – or luck – to catch some. Rats nibbled the stores, and sea water soaked the ship, sometimes putting the galley fire out and then nothing could be cooked. Sailors needed a sense of humour and a strong stomach to be able to eat the food, even the “hard tack” biscuits had maggots or weevils in and were best eaten with eyes closed.

Homeward Bound – eventually. If they survived – and many did not – then as the homeward bound ship, passing the Falkland Islands, would run before westerly winds and waves that carried them unhindered for thousands of miles … and home.

Tony Hodge

SECURE THE FUTUREOF WELSH FOOD AND

THE FOOD CONVERSATION

Anyone driving along the Port Road and past Pugh’s Garden Centre recently would have seen the poster ‘Secure the Future of Welsh Food’. It is part of the National Farmers Union (NFU) campaign and it’s no surprise to see it in Wenvoe as we have a NFU Cymru Deputy President, Abi Reader MBE. Abi is a third -generation mixed farmer, farming in partnership with her parents and uncle at Goldsland Farm. Some of our readers may have also visited the farm, during Open Farm Sunday, which is home to milking cows, sheep, beef cattle and around 120 acres of arable farmland. There is plenty of background to the NFU campaign which seeks to highlight the growing concern of food quality and food production, and includes a campaign video featuring Abi, at https://www.nfu-cymru.org.uk/campaigning/secure-welsh-food/

Of all the elements of our economy, food is one of the most important things we cannot manage without. A basic human need, at the centre of some of the biggest challenges we face with, global populations continuing to increase, natural resources diminishing and climate change increasingly impacting on growing cycles. Issues that place increasing pressure on global supply chains, and although a steady decline was witnessed over the last decade, global hunger is now on the rise again, affecting as much as 10% of the world’s population. The issues facing the food landscape is not only to ensure that everyone has access to sustainable and nutritious food but also to raise awareness of the dangers of ultra-processed foods. A wider movement started in the summer of 2023 is ‘The Food Conversation’ which sets out to increase participation in the issues of not just food production but transport, distribution and retail aspects along with what Government does, or should do. designed to be easy to understand and engaging. Everyone can participate and it claims to be methodologically robust, enabling in-depth conversation and deliberation (similar to approaches developed for citizen assemblies). https://thefoodconversation.uk/

Have we got the appetite in Wenvoe to discuss this and take part in The Food Conversation? In doing so we can be part of a UK-wide conversation about food and contribute to a push for improving our food system and ensuring change that needs to take place happens. Look up The Food Conversation for further information.

WELSH TRADITIONS 4

GWAU HOSANAU – KNITTING STOCKINGS

In rural Wales, one of the main cottage industries which flourished during the 18th Century was that of knitting stockings – not only for the family – but for selling in the local markets – and further afield. The towns of Bala, in southern Gwynedd, Llanrwst near Conwy and Tregaron in Cardiganshire were the main centres of the knitting industry, but we know that it also existed in many other locations all over Wales. It was said that Welsh women knitted stockings whenever they had their hands free. But it was not only the womenfolk who knitted; the men and the children, who were old enough, did so too.

Before anyone could start knitting, the yarn had to be prepared. Sheep farmers’ wives had enough wool for their needs, but the poorer cottagers were not able to afford to buy wool. So, as we heard last month, they would go out on wool gathering journeys, before the sheep were sheared, to collect tufts of wool snagged in the hedges and on gorse bushes and elsewhere. The right to gather the wool was valuable and young women who were employed as servants would make sure that they were given the two weeks off for wool gathering each year.

Once they had gathered a good supply of wool, they would carry it home, wash it and when it was dry, begin the process of carding it. This was often done with teasel heads – combing it or brushing it out until it was ready to be spun into yarn. It was now ready to be knitted – but at this stage, it could be dyed, using plants from the countryside.

Here are some of the colours that could be obtained:

• Different lichens would produce green or a deep pink, depending on the type of lichen
• Sloes would also produce a rose colour
• Elderberries and alum would produce a turquoise colour
• The roots of some types of straw would produce a red colour
• The bark, flowers and leaves of gorse would produce yellow
• Bracken would produce brown
• Dandelions produced magenta
• Onion skins can produce a range of colours from red to orange to brown – and more

As you can see, many colours could be produced by dyeing, but the stockings knitted tended to be plain black, grey or white – although, apparently, blue with white stripes was very popular. Many women of rural Wales were proficient spinners and highly skilled in the art of knitting. Despite the time-consuming labour involved in carding and spinning the wool into yarn prior to knitting, many were able to support themselves by knitting and selling stockings. Such was the demand that a Walter Davies, in 1799, estimated that annual production ran to approximately 192,000 pairs.

The late Minwel Tibbott, of the Museum of Welsh Life at St Fagans, stated that ‘Knitting stockings became a vital industry for many families throughout that time, and during famine periods, saved many a family from starvation – and this cottage industry continued to support families economically up until the early twentieth century’.

Between the financial benefits of knitting stockings and the lack of transportation in rural Wales during the 18th and 19th centuries, women often knitted while they walked or performed other duties. Using a yarn hook in the shape of an ‘S’, women would attach the upper hook to the waistband of their apron, then hang a ball of yarn from the lower hook. In this way, both hands would be free for knitting while they walked, often with a basket on their back, travelling to market, tending to animals, or collecting peat’. Knitting sheaths were popular; suspended from the hip, they bore the weight of the garment being knitted. These were handmade, carved, and given as love tokens, much like Welsh love spoons.

Knitting evenings were always popular – social evenings when knitters of both sexes gathered in someone’s house to enjoy a few hours of knitting accompanied by storytelling and singing. A good storyteller was always in great demand for these occasions and some of them had a great store of tales. Storytellers have been given pride of place at such gatherings in Wales for hundreds of years. We know that two of the most highly regarded members of the courts of the Welsh Princes in mediaeval times were the ‘Cyfarwydd’ – storyteller – and the Court Poet.

When the knitters had a good supply of stockings, they took them to market to sell to middle-men or dealers, who probably sold most of them at English markets, from where, it is said, many were exported to Europe and beyond. We know that some were exported via the port at Barmouth to Charleston, USA, the West Indies and the Gulf of Mexico. We know that stocking markets were held in many towns in Wales, from Llanilltud Fawr – Llantwit Major in the south, to Caergybi – Holyhead, in the north. The price of a pair of stockings varied from 6 pence (2 ½ pence in today’s money) – to ten shillings (50p today). But the average price for a plain pair of stockings was about 1 shilling (5p today).

Some stocking knitters would stand along the stage-coach highways to sell their wares to passing travellers. It is said that Welsh stockings were of high quality and long-lasting. Several members of the gentry purchased pairs as souvenirs during their tours of Wales – and tradition maintains that King George III insisted on wearing Bala stockings to relieve his rheumatism!

Today, the internationally known Corgi Socks factory in Rhydaman – Ammanford – which holds a Royal Warrant, and which has been producing socks, stockings and other items of knitwear since 1892 – is a worthy exponent of the Welsh stocking knitting tradition.

Ann M. Jones