The Cardiff Book of Days (5 page)

1900:
‘Charles Mullett, a young man with a star-shaped plaster on his forehead, charged George Turner, a wizened-looking man of 59, with hitting him with a hammer at Ethel Street. The facts were that Mullet interposed in a quarrel Turner had with his wife. The prisoner, it was alleged, ran into the street after the woman flourishing the hammer. Responding to her cries for help, Mullet ran between them and received the blow intended for the wife. The defence was that there was a struggle and that Mullett made an unauthorised intrusion into Turner's home. The bench imposed a fine of 40 shillings or one month's hard labour.' In another case on the same day, Margaret Walsall (40) was charged with assisting in the management of a disorderly house at 5 Little Homfray Street. She had a previous conviction for ‘shabeening' (brewing illicit spirits). (
Western Mail
)

1923:
St Illtyd's College, Courtney Road, opened. It was staffed by the Catholic De La Salle brothers who went on to serve education in Cardiff for seventy-four years. Over seventy former pupils of St Illtyd's were later ordained to the priesthood. The college buildings were badly damaged by a German bomb on the night of 4th March 1941 but the school continued to function in what was left of the premises. (John O'Sullivan & Bryn Jones,
Cardiff: A Centenary Celebration
, The History Press, 2005)

2011:
Designer Tim Rice (41) of Grangetown announced his ambitious scheme to redecorate the interior of Brains Brewery's ‘Yard Bar & Kitchen' pub diner by plastering the ceilings of the toilets with hundreds of pictures of bottoms. Asked where he would get his ‘models', he told
Wales on Sunday
, ‘I've been looking everywhere from porn sites on the internet to cosmetic surgery catalogues. I've even put out requests to my friends on Facebook to take their own pictures and email them to me. I wanted to go for a look that defied description'. His award-winning redesign of the former dairy at Pontcanna into an art gallery included ‘burlesque dancers can-canning across crocodile-skin floors'.

1908:
David Lloyd George was made an Honorary Freeman of the City of Cardiff. The honour was conferred by the Lord Mayor, Alderman Illtyd Thomas. This was the first freedom presentation to take place in the new City Hall. (Stewart Williams,
Cardiff Yesterday
)

1994:
The
South Wales Echo
appears as a tabloid newspaper for the first time.

2005:
Sixty thousand people gathered in the Millennium Stadium for a rock concert to raise funds for those affected by the Asian Tsunami of Boxing Day 2004. The Prince of Wales contributed a message of support that was relayed to the crowd via giant video screens. The event had been organised in just twenty-one days by the stadium's General Manager, Paul Sergeant. It raised £1,248,963. (
South Wales Echo
)

1795:
While construction of a new bridge over the River Taff was still in progress, a sudden thaw after a long cold spell released vast quantities of ice which demolished the temporary replacement structure. Traffic, including the London mail coach, had to be diverted via Llandaff for many months. The new bridge (on the site of the present one) was not completed until the following year – only to be carried away by another flood some years later. (William Rees,
Cardiff: A History of the City
, Cardiff Corporation, 1969)

1908:
New City Freeman David Lloyd George ‘kicked off' the rugby match between Cardiff and Blackheath at the Arms Park. His kick went the full ten yards and Cardiff eventually won 19-3. Lloyd George was at that time president of the Board of Trade but went on to become Prime Minister and one of the country's greatest politicians. (Stewart Williams,
Cardiff Yesterday
)

1945:
German POWs were employed to clear snow in Cardiff after transport was disrupted by a sudden blizzard, Cardiff's worst since 1878. (Stewart Williams,
Cardiff Yesterday
)

1973:
Local politicians were shocked by the announcement of the result of a council by-election held the previous day. Schoolteacher Yvette Roblin unexpectedly won the ‘true-blue' Penylan ward with her slogan ‘Stop The Hook Road'. The Conservative-controlled City Council had been expected to approve the controversial new road which would have run through Roath and Adamsdown to Cardiff Bay. Two thousand homes would have been compulsorily purchased and demolished in the scheme which had been proposed in traffic expert Professor Colin Buchanan's 1999 ‘Plan for Cardiff'. The new road would also cut through Cathays cemetery, necessitating the exhumation and reburial of a thousand bodies. The by-election result changed everything. When the Planning Committee met, its Conservative chairman Reg Watkiss formally proposed that the scheme go ahead – but then deliberately abstained from voting, allowing it to be defeated by just one vote. (John O'Sullivan & Bryn Jones,
Cardiff: A Centenary Celebration
, The History Press, 2005)

1928:
The execution of Danny Driscoll and Edward ‘Titch' Rowland for the death of Dai Lewis, whose throat was cut in a fight near the entrance to the Wyndham Arcade, St Mary's Street, the previous September. Neither had actually inflicted the fatal wound. This was done by Rowlands' younger brother John, who had been declared insane and sent to Broadmoor. The fight had been over Lewis's attempts to take over a protection racket being operated by the Rowlands at Ely Racecourse. Many felt that the death sentences were too harsh and more than 500,000 people throughout Britain signed a petition calling for the men to be reprieved. The Home Secretary, Sir Austen Chamberlain, refused, even when two of the jury who had found the men guilty, travelled to London to plead on their behalf. Canon Daniel Holmes of St David's Catholic Cathedral heard Driscoll's last confession and told the congregation at Mass that ‘they hanged an innocent man this morning'. (John O'Sullivan & Bryn Jones,
Cardiff: A Centenary Celebration
, The History Press, 2005)

1316:
Ordered by King Edward II to answer charges of treason and threatened with execution, Llewelyn Bren, son of Gruffydd ap Rees, rose in revolt in early 1316. Beginning with a surprise attack on Caerphilly Castle in which the town was set on fire and inhabitants slaughtered, Llewelyn's revolt quickly spread throughout Glamorgan and Gwent. Castles loyal to the King were attacked and, on the 28th, Cardiff was raided and many buildings in the town destroyed. The rebels were defeated by the King's forces in March and the siege of Caerphilly lifted after six weeks. Llewelyn surrendered and was held prisoner in the Tower of London. In November 1317 Hugh Despenser, one of the king's favourites at court who had been made Lord of Glamorgan in November, conveyed Llewelyn to Cardiff Castle where, without any orders from the King to do so and no proper trial, had him hung, drawn and quartered. Despenser had parts of his body exhibited around Glamorgan before he was buried at the Grey Friars in Cardiff. His actions were widely condemned as Llewelyn's gallant behaviour and noble bearing had earned him the respect of many. (John Davies
et al
.,
The Welsh Academy Encyclopaedia of Wales
, 2008)

1951:
Evangelical preacher Evan Roberts died in a home for the elderly at Penylan. He was the Calvinistic Methodist preacher whose oratory brought about the Welsh Revival of 1904-5. Chapels were packed with fervent worshippers and thousands were converted to Christianity. Yet many opponents wrote off the whole thing as mass hysteria. The young and handsome Roberts attracted many young women as devotees, regarded by some as ‘little better than chorus girls'. What some did for him shocked critics; ‘they even washed his socks' some whispered, this at a time when flirting and reading romantic novels signified to some a soul lost to the Devil. Yet all the adulation became too much for this highly-strung young man given to lengthy prayer sessions in the small hours. Aged 27 and claiming that opponents were trying to hypnotise him, he suffered an emotional collapse and retreated to a friend's house in Leicester where he became a virtual recluse, cutting off family and friends and refusing to answer letters. He spent the rest of his life living on the charity of a few supporters and made only a few brief appearances at religious festivals. (John O'Sullivan & Bryn Jones,
Cardiff: A Centenary Celebration
, The History Press, 2005)

1925:
The death of Cardiff boxer ‘Peerless' Jim Driscoll was marked in one boxing magazine with the headline ‘the King Is Dead'. Born in Newtown, Cardiff, Driscoll won over fifty professional fights in Britain before going to America. He outboxed US featherweight title-holder Abe Atell in a bout in 1909 but was unable to secure the knockout that would have given him the title. A title rematch was arranged but Driscoll opted to come home as he had promised to raise money for orphans being cared for by the Sisters of Mercy in Cardiff. The First World War deprived him of the chance to fight for the title again. The end of his career came when he was defeated by Frenchman Charles Ledoux in London in 1921. He died at the Duke of Edinburgh Hotel (where he was the landlord) at the corner of Ellen Street, the street where he was born. One hundred thousand mourners lined the route of his cortege and it was reported that ‘hard-bitten boxers wept unashamedly'. (John O'Sullivan & Bryn Jones,
Cardiff: A Centenary Celebration
, The History Press, 2005)