Paul Daniels Coming Home

This is a pack of cards...

Magician Paul Daniels is coming home to Wales to trace his family's past.

This is dated 1876.

He is... "Mainly intelligent."

"Mainly intelligent."

The journey will take him back to his Carmarthenshire roots.

Written on these stones is people history.

To see it just crumbling away, I think is really sad.

But it won't just be gravestones unearthing some magical surprises.

"Let me out. Let me out." Did you hear that?

It's no wonder I grew up confused, is it?

At his home in Henley, magician Paul Daniels

has been researching his Carmarthen ancestry for several years.

Recently, he discovered something

that's made him determined to visit Wales.

I found this,

which is a charter roll,

the seventeenth charter roll of Henry III in 1233.

The King is basically giving me South Wales.

HE LAUGHS

Not really. It's a mill and land,

but it's in perpetuity.

I think I'll go back there and say,

"Get off my land. Get out of my mill".

MUSIC: Magic by Pilot

Have fun.

From Paul's research, he knows there were policemen in the family.

Now he's heading to Carmarthen in West Wales,

where five generations of his family lived,

hoping to find out much, much more.

I've always felt a kind of inner pride in being

of a Welsh nation.

Welsh, somehow, seems much older than being English.

WELSH ACCENT: My singing voice is absolutely marvellous.

And I'm already slipping into the accent, aren't I?

I should learn that song, really, shouldn't I?

# We'll keep a welcome in the hillside. #

I shall sing it as we cross the border.

MUSIC: We'll Keep A Welcome In The Hillsides

# We'll keep a welcome in the hillsides

# We'll keep a welcome in the vales

# This land you knew will still be singing... #

Carmarthen genealogist, Greg Howes,

has been researching the Daniels story.

He'll be helping Paul delve even further into his family history.

Ah, the man. The man. Good morning.

Are you Greg? I am. Hello, Paul. How are you?

When I was last in South Wales, I found a book.

Already, you're there ahead of me. Here's a copy of it, bound.

And in this, all these charters,

one says there's a mill round here

that was given to Daniel in perpetuity.

Now, come on, what are the odds on that Daniel

being my ancient, ancient, ancient,

ancient predecessor?

There's an outside possibility. Very, very outside.

Because you couldn't prove it wasn't, really.

We're going back about thirty generations. Blimey.

Which is, you know, a hell of a way to get a link.

Most parish registers in Wales start about 1750

that are now accessible. So for us...

Despite the difficulties, Greg's prepared to give it a go,

and has already made a start.

We've managed to go back five generations.

The earliest Daniels we've found is 1781.

We did manage to go back another generation with David Woozley.

He was baptised in 1786.

So there may be more leverage there. Right.

David Woozley is Paul's great-great-great-grandfather.

It's quite tangled, as a lot of family trees are.

I'd say we can go back five generations with it. Right.

So I can't go and get the rent on this mill?

You could try. I will, I will.

BOTH LAUGH

Proving a link between Paul and an ancestor from 1233

is going to be pretty difficult.

But he's determined to claim his rightful inheritance.

In the meantime, he sets out to track down

other characters on his family tree.

The tree shows five generations of relatives with roots in Carmarthen

stretching back to 1781.

According to the records, these were humble people.

Butchers, shoemakers and carpenters.

But as Paul's going to discover,

the Daniels kept law and order in Carmarthen for more than 160 years.

His great-grandfather, David Augustus Woozley Daniel,

was a policeman in 19th-Century Carmarthen.

At the local police museum, Paul's delving into the past.

I bet you can't do tricks with that.

No, no. But look at that.

Now, that's Victorian. During the Victorian period...

You'd feel you'd been decorated if you'd been hit with that.

Just slide it in, clip it closed.

Very good. She's ready for exposure.

I recognise these.

Most magicians have played with them at one time or another.

I own several sets myself.

MUSIC: Lovestruck by Hush

There, you see, I look like Stan Laurel with this one.

I've been looking through our records

and I've come across your great-great-grandfather's record.

Here we've got his name - David Daniel.

Yeah. Twenty-four years, six months.

Height - five-foot-eight and a quarter.

Complexion - fair, eyes - grey. Hair - dark brown.

That wasn't fair, that's florid.

You're right, it's florid. It's the old-type writing.

It is florid, you're absolutely right.

I'm glad you came, Paul. I'm glad I brought my glasses.

Last employment - fireman and shoemaking.

I didn't know he was a fireman.

Part of the duty of being a constable

is that he had to attend a fire as well.

We've also found a recommendation from the vicarage in Carmarthen.

"he is mainly intelligent."

Mainly intelligent?

That's great, though. That's nice.

And the other amazing thing is that

very few of these records have survived.

That's really great.

Paul tries on the uniform his great-grandfather would have worn.

Where am I? Eight, seven, six.

Number five, that's what I'm looking for.

Let's see if there's anybody in.

David Daniel and eight other people all lived together here

at the turn of the 19th Century.

That's a bit of a shame, nobody in. Never mind.

A few years ago, Paul got a letter revealing some shady secrets here.

PC Daniel was not quite, well, PC.

Oh, it was a pretty wild place, I'll tell you.

Some time ago, I found out my dad had three living cousins.

They were in their 80s and 90s.

They were very good, they gave me some photographs and stuff.

And then one of them wrote me this letter.

Even these three little old ladies

didn't know what was going off. It says,

"My niece, Margaret Price, came here this week.

"She told me that my eldest sister, Margaret,

"told her years ago that DAW," my great-granddad,

"had Auntie Jane and Auntie Margaret both in trouble."

HE CHUCKLES

"It was a shock. Why my sisters kept it from us, I can't think."

And they all lived here. HE LAUGHS

So my great-grandfather

married a lady

who didn't give him a male child.

So he had a male child with that lady's niece.

And when that lady died,

he married the niece's sister.

That must be this Margaret.

And Jane was the mother of his son.

I think I've got that right.

It's no wonder I grew up confused, is it? HE LAUGHS

So, Paul's great-grandfather was married to Ann Howels,

but had no children.

He went on to have an illegitimate child

with his wife's niece, Jane Price.

This illegitimate child was Paul's grandfather, Handel Newton.

When Jane died, David married Jane's sister, Margaret.

She gave him three daughters, Paul's cousins.

These colourful domestic arrangements

didn't stop David Daniel from being a pillar of society.

At Carmarthen's record office is the original police station logbook

kept by Paul's great-grandfather.

1893.

This is a log, isn't it? It's a job log.

That's right. It's the police station diary.

I think this is your great-grandfather.

My great-grandfather? That's interesting.

He's not using his full name, he's just using the first D.

He had more names than that.

HE CHUCKLES

This is fabulous. This is really good.

Look at how ornate the V and that NE is.

"Remained there on duty until 9:30am.

"A lecture being held at Methodist chapel."

And then he's clocking off at 11:30 at night.

Long days.

This is all kind of peaceful.

Having said that, look, I've opened up here.

"Riotous behaviour in church."

There was a bit of trouble. Yes, there was.

In fact, there's a document here you might be interested in.

It's the Felons Register.

"Stealing two pieces of

"something and silk."

That's a woman. Yes. Yes.

"..And silk handkerchiefs. Value - 10 shillings."

Off with her head!

What's this one? That's pretty darn serious, that's a stabbing.

But then you start to think, "Well, nothing's changed."

You read the newspapers today, we are still getting stabbings.

It's sad that in over 100 years,

we don't seem to have learned the lessons.

The crimes Paul's great-grandfather dealt with

inspired him to follow in his footsteps.

He's joined two modern-day counterparts

on the very same beat in the centre of Carmarthen.

MUSIC: The Bill Theme Tune

It doesn't take long for Paul to start enforcing the law.

Where do you think you're going?

Up there. How are you?

Alright. Where do you think you're going?

And if you don't mind, it's PC Daniels.

Arrest him.

Let me get all the cards out of here.

In Carmarthen market, Paul just can't resist putting on a show.

What I'm going to do to make sure there's no cheating,

I'm going to shuffle the cards like this.

Once the cards are shuffled,

you can see they're all as they are and they're all different.

Sylvia, take one of them. Any one. Do you want that one or that one?

Look at it, remember it, shove it in.

Everybody can see it. Happy?

Yeah. OK. I'm going to get rid of it.

Take the cards and deal them one at a time on there, face up.

When you get to your card, think, "Stop", but go past it.

This is a trained officer of the law. Trained in detection.

She's looking for her card.

Which could be anywhere at all in the pack.

LAUGHTER

I've had a card on my mind for some time now.

SHE LAUGHS

What?

APPLAUSE

MUSIC: A Kind Of Magic by Queen

It could take some quite spectacular magic, though,

to conjure up the mill Paul is so desperate to find.

Greg Howes has discovered a footnote in the 1233 town charter

from local historian, Alcuin Evans, referencing Pontcarreg Mill.

On the outskirts of Carmarthen, Paul finds out more.

We are at Pontcarreg Mill.

This particular building? That's right. This is it.

Right. Well, quick! These are the maps I've...

No, no, I need some flags. Some Daniels flags?

To claim this land in the name of the Daniels clan.

So I reckon that all that bit there is mine.

It could well be. But names, like surnames, shift.

Is pont, bridge? Yes. And carreg is stone.

It wouldn't have been the only sort of stone bridge in this area,

or perhaps even the only mill with that name.

Would it have looked like that?

It wouldn't have been much different.

And certainly, when the footnote was done by Alcuin Evans,

it would have looked very much the same.

The problem with the footnote is that it was just a guess.

In fact, he does say, "It's possible that this is the location for it".

So Pontcarreg Mill, but it's not the right one.

While Greg continues his search,

Paul's keen to find out about another policeman in his family.

In fact, he was one of the first policemen in Carmarthen.

Paul knew his great-grandfather, David Daniel, was a policeman.

His family's association with the boys in blue goes back much further.

All the way to David Woozley, his great-great-great-grandfather.

He was stationed at the old police lockup,

now undergoing building work near the town walls.

That was the jail? Not the jail.

It was more like a holding centre

for a prisoner en route to jail,

being transported from one part of the country to another.

Here we have the watch and ward constables.

Amongst them is your great-great- great-grandfather, David Woozley.

1836 - 1866.

That's a good run. It is quite a good run.

The interesting thing about this

is that he died on duty at the age of 82.

Blimey!

The reasons for leaving -

this one was dismissed, dismissed, dismissed. Drink. Drink.

Dismissed. Drink. Drink.

Drink, drink, drink, drink, drink. This is typical.

But my great-great-great-granddad

was the only one who made it without getting caught.

Well, that's quite true.

And if you look, it just continues.

David Woozley not only had an exemplary record as a policeman,

but was involved in a very important event in Wales's history -

The Rebecca Riots.

The story began here.

Who was Rebecca and why was she rioting?

Let's get one thing straight.

There's no one Rebecca, there are many Rebeccas.

And the riots are about toll roads and toll gates

and the prices farmers were being charged.

I heard a rumour about this.

There were farmers dressed as women. Yep, absolutely.

This is about a whole sort of social class.

Farmers, farmers' labourers, tradesmen.

It's about low agricultural wages,

low agricultural prices.

The fact they haven't got a vote.

They'd had enough. Yes. And, if you like,

the tolls that were being charged

was the straw that broke the camel's back.

And that sparked the whole thing off in 1839.

When tolls were levied on all the routes into market,

peasants and farmers took matters into their own hands,

destroying the toll gates.

My ancestor somewhere along the line was involved in this.

The reason your great-great- great-grandfather was involved

is because he was in the police force in Carmarthen.

They had to try and to quell the riots in this area.

So he wasn't in a frock? No.

I'm pleased to hear that. HE LAUGHS

So you've brought me out here, into this field,

the remnants of moo cows are here,

but why here? Why this field?

Well, you've got to imagine, in 1843,

that all this area is a vast agricultural area.

You get a good feel of it today.

And they assemble here at the pub, and there's two thousand of them.

You can't get them all in the bar,

so all these fields must have been full of people all dressed up,

200, 300 of them on horseback.

They'd have been up on the hills.

They'd have been coming in from the farms and gathering together.

MUSIC: I Predict A Riot by Kaiser Chiefs

If you think about it, because you said that

my great-great-great-granddad and his compatriots

set out from Carmarthen to come and take them on, as it were.

It's a bit bold, isn't it? 40-odd. "Oops! Have we made a mistake?"

They were coming up the road, somebody, amongst these farmers,

must have gone and told them. There had to be a snitch.

Basically, once you tell one person, another dozen or so know.

You couldn't have kept this secret.

And they knew the magistrates were calling in the troops,

they new something was about to happen.

The troops were coming in, along with the special constables.

So, yes, both sides knew

the battle lines were being drawn.

As a result of David Woozley's role in quelling rioters

and his flawless record, he was a legendary figure.

When he died, his funeral was so lavish, it was recorded in print.

"We record the death of a remarkable inhabitant of this town,

"Mr David Woozley.

"He was of great height."

I wonder what happened to me?

"He was of great height and was 82 years old when he died.

"Many members of the police force were pallbearers at the funeral,

"which was, perhaps, the largest and most respectable of its kind

"ever witnessed in Carmarthen."

And I think that happened here.

Records show that David Woozley was indeed buried here.

Finding his headstone in this graveyard may prove difficult.

I really can't see that.

No.

To find out that he was so well known and so well respected,

and he seems to have been a member of everything in the town

and had his finger in lots of pies.

And to come and find it in a state like this,

I feel this, not just about my family,

but for all the families.

I feel it's a bit sad

that they're not preserved, not looked after.

This is real people history.

Written on these stones is people history.

And to see it just crumbling away,

I think is really sad.

In the surrounding countryside, Paul's got a date

with one of Carmarthen's oldest-known legends.

Well, I've been sent on this long walk across two fields,

dodging cowpats.

I've no idea why.

It's going to be very interesting.

He's not the only magician with connections to the town.

Hi, Paul. Hello. And you are?

My name's Gavin. Gavin Evans.

Nice to meet you, Gavin. You were well secreted behind the rock.

This is known as Merlin's Stone.

There is a local story associated with this stone.

That Merlin, the famous wizard,

buried his gold beneath this stone. And he told a prophecy,

that should anyone dig beneath this stone to steal his gold,

that stone would fall and crush them.

And funnily enough, a few centuries ago, so the story goes,

a young man did exactly that.

And guess what? The stone fell on him and killed him.

Well, I'll dig and you push that side so it can't fall.

We'll keep it up. Yeah.

Hang on while I just do something. This is really good. I want a hug.

Hi, Merlin. How you doing?

"Let me out. Let me out."

Did you hear that? He's in there. "Let me out."

Can't do that, Merlin.

That's really made my trip.

I find it very exciting.

I would certainly advise all my fellow magicians now

to come and pay homage here.

Before leaving Carmarthen, Paul has one mission left to accomplish.

He still wants to track down his mill.

In fact, the one closest to the Tywi was known as the Tywi Mill.

Funnily enough!

There's an original name.

It is. And almost certainly, this was the mill

discussed in the 1233 Charter.

It was the most valuable mill in the early medieval period.

It was the one which generated the most revenue.

Paul might not be leaving Carmarthen with a water mill,

but is he leaving with a new sense of identity?

Has Paul Daniels come home?

I just think it's marvellous.

Highlights for me?

Probably going to the place of the funeral

of my great-great-great grandfather, and his burial place.

Merlin's Stone, of course, because of the magic connection.

But generally, the whole package deal

has been very rewarding. Very good. Very happy.

And... HE LAUGHS I'll do an Arnold Schwarzenegger.

I'll be back.

Can we put this on the top for when we go home?

Upset them as we cross the border.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

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