Carrying on the story of my grandparents!

As I’ve mentioned previously, two of my grandparents came from the Llanelli area; my maternal grandmother, whose family I wrote about in my last column, and my paternal grandfather, who was from Felinfoel.

Once again, in the back of my mind, I had always assumed that if he was from Felinfoel, then probably, so were his parents. Once again I was wrong!

This branch of my family was easier to find because, unlike the Harries branch, the Richards branch had settled in one place and stayed there. Also, the only variation I found in the spelling of their surname Richards was that it appeared as Richard in one of the censuses.

Unlike my maternal grandmother, my paternal grandfather was in the 1901 Census, as he had been born in 1896. His father was also down on the same census but his place of birth wasn’t Felinfoel like my grandfather, but a little further up the road in Llannon.

My great grandfather on the Richards side of the family was John Richards. He was born in a place called Gilvach, Glyn Hamlet, Llannon, in 1848.

In 1870-1872, Glyn Hamlet was described by John Marius Wilson’s Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales as “GLYN, a hamlet in Llanelly parish, Carmarthen; under Mynydd Sulien, 4¼ miles NNW of Llanelly. Real property, £2, 924; of which £. 277 are in mines. Pop., 851. Houses, 170.”

I found John early on in my search for my ancestors. During my visits to Llanelli library’s Reference Library, I found Census records for him from 1851 through to 1901. When the 1911 Census became available, I found John was still alive at the time of that Census and working as a farm labourer.

By the time of the 1891 Census, I noticed that the Richards household had changed: John’s father, William, had died in 1889 and John had married my great grandmother, Catherine, nee Davies. John’s mother, my great great grandmother Esther, nee Daniel, was still alive by the 1891 Census and her son and daughter in law were living with her. Esther had passed away by the time of the 1901 Census and John, Catherine and their daughter and son, my grandfather, were living at the family home.

John lived and worked in the Felinfoel area throughout his adult life. He worked as a furnace man in both the tin industry and in the brickworks. He also worked as a labourer for the water authority and as a farm labourer.

John and Catherine married on 15th November 1890 in Tabor Chapel, Llannon. John was aged 42 and Catherine was aged 39, so both married quite late in life. It was the only marriage for both of them.

As with my other great grandmother, Mary Jenkins, I don’t know much about Catherine’s life before she married in 1890. She states on the Census records that she was born in the Llanelli area; sometimes she put Llannon down as her place of birth. On her marriage certificate, it states that her father was David Davies, a farmer. Catherine gave her year of birth as 1849 – 1851 over 3 Census forms. Catherine’s place of residence at the time of her wedding was Cwmtawel, Llannon.

I checked with the Llanelli registrar’s office back in 2009 and they do not have a birth record anywhere in Carmarthenshire, over a 10 year range from 1846 to 1856, for a Catherine Davies with a father named David Davies. The probability is that she was born in one of the counties surrounding Carmarthenshire, possibly a rural one such as Pembrokeshire or Breconshire. She probably came to Carmarthenshire for work.

It seems to be a common practice that, when completing Census forms, some people would put down as their place of birth the location where they were currently residing or the same place of birth as someone else in their household. This might have been what happened in Catherine’s case.

A reason for this could be that people may have left their birth family at an early age and genuinely couldn’t remember or did not know their place of birth. This is a real possibility in Catherine’s case: one of my cousins, who is also tracing the family tree, found an obituary dated from 1934, for Elizabeth, my great aunt, who was John and Catherine’s eldest child. She died at the age of 42. It mentions that Elizabeth’s mother Catherine was a housemaid in Porthyrhyd, Carmarthenshire.

On questioning his father, my cousin found out that Catherine was rumoured to have gone into service at the age of 10. If this is true, then it could explain why Catherine put down her place of birth on the Census forms as the Llannon/Llanelli area, places where both her husband and her mother in law were born. If she had been living away from her parents and her family home since she was a child, she may not have remembered her place of birth.

Catherine died in Felinfoel in 1913; John died in Felinfoel in 1929. Both are buried at Adulam cemetery in Felinfoel, as are my great great grandparents, William and Esther Richards.

I am still researching both Catherine’s origins and the origins of my other great grandmother, Mary Jenkins, whom I spoke about in my previous column.

Don’t forget that you can contact Yvonne for advice or help on family history by emailing familyties@llanellitown.com.