James Daniel Matthews

The Memories of James Daniel Matthews (1910-1997) formerly of 30 New William Street, Blaenavon (written in 1982)

My maternal grandfather Daniel Price (1835-1895) came from Longtown, Herefordshire. He was a thatcher by trade and went to Llanellen with his wife, my grandmother Jane, in 1852, to work, helping to make the Keeper’s Pond (building the dry wall bank). They later moved to Pwll Du where the limestone quarry and the Pwll Du Tunnel were working full time. Later still they moved to Cwm Defen Cottage, Blaenavon.

My grandmother’s name before marriage was Jane Lewes from Ty-Shorse Farm, Capel-y-ffin, Llanthony. The oldest child of five, her father’s name was James Lewes, a Welsh farmer. He is buried in Capel-y-ffin Churchyard.

My mother was Jane’s only child. Born in Llanellen, her name was Mary Price, better known as Polly; she married James Matthews in 1887. James Matthews came from Kington, near Leominster in Herefordshire when he was ten years old, under the seat of the railway carriage because he had no money to pay his fare. He was born in 1870 and died in 1942. His father was a waggoner, he ‘stole’ his wife from a big house in the country by ladder from her bedroom window but her family disowned her forever for doing it. They had four children; my father was the youngest son.

Anyways, James Matthews came to Blaenavon in 1880 to work, driving a horse on the Coke Yard for six shillings a week. He paid four shillings per week for board and lodgings with a Mrs. Evans in Phillip Street and sent one shilling per week to help his widowed mother (his father had died when James was five). James still had one shilling left to have a good time in what was, to him, a strange boom town.

In 1883 he started in the coalmines and in time became under manager of Milfraen Colliery, Blaenavon. Though he never passed his Second Class Mining Certificate, he spent his life in mining.

James married Mary Price (my mother) in 1887, they had four daughters and their last child was a son (myself). I was born in 1910 and started to work in Milfraen Pit in 1924. In 1929 I was actually down the pit when an explosion occurred. I was shocked and bruised but not badly hurt. Nine of my friends were killed and 27 hurt. I stayed to rescue. I have spent a ll of my working life in the pit. Big Pit is the Pit that I worked last and retired from in 1970, ending a mining career that began with my father in 1883 and ended with me. I cannot see any of my family going down a pit to work in the future, because this is not a mining district anymore.

This story was kindly donated to the Blaenavon World Heritage Centre by James Daniel Matthews’s son, Terry Matthews|, in August 2010.