Chartists Remembered
| This weekend Newport celebrates the 168th anniversary of the Chartist Uprising of 1839. Enjoy a day of local stories, step into early Victorian Newport and discover how descendants have found their Chartist roots on the Chartist Ancestors: Pioneers of Democracy day at St Mary''s Institute on Stow Hill on Saturday 3rd November from 11.00am – 5.00pm |
| |
Follow this with a tour of local Chartist sites on Sunday 4th November from 10 am - 4pm and join the annual memorial service at St. Woolos Cathedral at 4:30pm. For further information contact pat.drewett@ntlworld.com or telephone 01633 677783.
|
| |
Newport Local- a story surrounding the Chartists
The 4th November is the anniversary of the Newport Chartist Uprising of 1839, when over 20 Chartists were shot dead, and 3 where found guilty of treason and deported to Australia for life.
|
 |
Piece of Newport history ends up at Colchester scrap yard!
A Chartist silver plaque almost ended up patching up a hole on an MOT failure after an unexpected find at a Colchester scrap yard.
Mr Nicholas, who thought the sheet of metal perfect for use on his car, soon noticed inscriptions and a crest. After further inspection he realised that this was a silver plaque and decided to investigate further.
Once cleaned by a jeweller, the plaque’s Newport connections soon became clear. It was once part of an elaborate silver dinner service presented to Sir Thomas Phillips as a thanksgiving for the suppression of the Chartists. |
| |
Sir Thomas Phillips – who’s he?
Thomas Phillips was Mayor at the time of the Chartist insurrection at Newport in 1839 and suffered gun shot wounds to his arm and groin as the battle was fought.
Now displayed at Newport Museum, it lists 123 businesses, industrialists and landowners, who contributed 800 guineas for its manufacture at the workshop of Benjamin Smith in Lincoln Inn Fields, London. Sir Charles Morgan of Tredegar House tops the list.
No picture of the silver service exists and its whereabouts are unknown today. The Monmouthshire Merlin newspaper describe the gift as “…two highly ornamented ice vases, one soup tureen and four dishes with covers, one venison dish, four other dishes of comparable size and an ornate candelabrum…”
Sir Thomas received the gift on September 24, 1840 at a public gathering in the National School opposite St Paul’s Church. A dinner in his honour followed at the Westgate Inn with 120 invited guests.
|
 |
The mystery of the missing silver dinner service
The whole dinner service was left to Phillips’ brother’s son, a London lawyer but it is possible that the plaque became detached from rest of the dinner service.
Sir Thomas Phillips had a home in London, as well as at Llanellen and some items might have remained at Llanellen House during the seven years that his mother continued living there.
Or did his cousin, Thomas Phillips Price acquire the service? He was a bachelor living with his parents at the rectory in Llanarth, until he became Liberal MP for North Monmouthshire between 1885 and 1895 and settled in Essex. He went on to purchase Marks Hall near Colchester, dying there in 1932.
Twenty five years after the surprise scrap yard find no further pieces have come to light. Before the 1970s, Victorian silver ware had little market value but may have been melted down for its bullion value. Did the plaque have a narrow escape?!
A special Chartist anniversary edition of the Monmouthshire Merlin can be found in the October edition of Newport Matters.
With thanks to Les James, University of Wales, Newport.
|
| |
|
News