John Rhys-Davies Coming Home

Coming home and swapping the Hollywood Hills

for the hills of South Wales, is actor John Rhys-Davies.

Here in search of his Welsh ancestry.

RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK THEME PLAYS

To a new generation of fans

he's courageous Gimli in the Lord Of The Rings.

But in a career spanning over 50 years and 100 movies,

he will always be most fondly known for his many hair-raising

adventures starring alongside Harrison Ford

in the epic series of the much-loved Indiana Jones movies.

And in all that time,

John Rhys-Davies has never forgotten his Welsh roots.

And especially his Welsh grandmother

from the former coal mining town of Ammanford in Carmarthenshire.

Sarah Emily was my grandmother.

She was the only grandparent that I knew.

She was the only grandparent that was alive at my birth.

So John knew his grandmother well,

but is particularly keen to know more of his grandfather, William,

someone he never had the chance to meet.

It's here in Carmarthenshire that the journey begins,

as John Rhys-Davies is coming home.

John Rhys-Davies was born 1944 in Salisbury, Wiltshire,

to Welsh parents, Rhys and Phyllis Davies.

His early childhood was spent in Wales

before his family later moved abroad but for John,

it's the town of Ammanford that's always felt like home.

And it's here, in the centre of town,

that he's come to a very special place for his family

to meet with genealogist Mike Churchill Jones.

-Hi, John. Welcome to Christian Temple, in Ammanford. Christian Temple Chapel.

-Yes, indeed.

-Familiar to you, I understand?

-Very familiar.

I was christened here. My mother was married here.

All by the same man, the Rev Teglan Davies.

Right. I've been researching your family tree.

And this is what I've come up with. On your paternal side

-you have deep Welsh roots in the Swansea Valley.

-Very good.

Deep Welsh roots in Camarthenshire.

John can also trace a long line of Welsh ancestors

on his mother's side of the tree

and straightaway Mike can reveal that on his maternal line,

John comes from generations

of traditional Welsh wool spinners and weavers,

beginning with his great, great, great grandfather, Evan Humphreys.

He was born in Llanover.

-And he was a wool weaver by trade.

-Very good.

Evan Humphreys married Margaret Hoskins in 1824.

She was recorded as being a pauper.

Evan and Margaret had a son, Thomas Humphreys,

who was also a weaver and spinner and was born in Monmouthshire.

Monmouthshire?

The lives of Thomas Humphreys and his wife Mary

will be an important story for John to follow in the tree.

But there is also one family legend John would love to try and resolve.

There is a clock

that my...Auntie Vi inherited

and she passed on to Janet, her daughter,

who may already have passed it on

that, legend had, was made by someone in the family.

There is plenty for John to discover on his journey

but there is one other person on the tree

with whom he had a very special bond, his late father, Rhys Davies.

Rhys, my beloved father.

Born in 1909 in Ammanford.

I think, not just one of the strongest men

that I ever met,

but I think, in some ways, the greatest man.

John was christened Henry John Davies, but later, as a stage name,

he adopted his father's name of Rhys Davies, to become John Rhys-Davies.

Clearly they had a very close relationship.

I have never admired a man...

-..so much.

-Indeed, indeed.

He showed me what moral courage is.

For the first visit on John's journey, he's off to discover

his mother Phyllis' side of the family tree.

John is heading west.

He's learnt that his great great grandfather, Thomas Humphreys,

was a wool weaver and spinner.

For an insight into this industry, once commonplace right across Wales,

he's come to Drefach Felindre,

an area once known as "the Huddersfield of Wales",

with 21 woollen mills in the area, producing flannel cloth from wool.

To try and get an understanding of what life was typically like

for Welsh spinners and weavers at this time,

he meets with historian Hedd Ladd Lewis

who has been researching Thomas' story.

He worked in the weaving industry and he would have lived, probably,

in a small cottage similar to these weaving cottages here.

Are weavers and spinners interchangeable terms?

In many ways, they are, but they were actually two distinct skills.

But very often the spinners would become weavers.

How old was he?

He was 21 when he married. And, which was, I suppose, fairly young.

He was illiterate, because we can see

on his marriage certificate that he marked his name with a cross.

His wife, as well, marked her name with a cross.

And he would have had a hard life.

He obviously came from a very poor background.

Thomas's mother, Margaret, was recorded as being a pauper.

She died in 1872.

You know, being a weaver was not an easy job.

They worked long, long hours in miserable conditions

in very damp cottages,

and you know, these cottages, they look lovely now

but I should imagine, 150 years ago...

-They would've been cold and damp.

-Yes, yes.

Quite possible, you could almost describe them as being hovels.

The life of a weaver was hard.

Long, long hours, working in a dark room, and you can imagine them,

you know, plying their trade, day in, day out,

and really working for a pittance.

Flannel weaving in Wales can be traced back to the Middle Ages.

A way of life that would barely change until the 19th century.

Traditionally, hand loom weavers and spinners would produce

their flannel from home, but by the mid 19th century,

this traditional way of life was under threat.

That threat was mechanisation.

At Wales' National Wool Museum,

social historian Peter Hill explains more.

So, John, you can see here we have a spinning mule.

The version we have is, a Welshman, Richard Roberts, from Newtown,

created this, which is one of the first automatic machines,

so really transformed the industry

when it was introduced from the 1830s onwards.

From the early 19th century, these machines and earlier versions

were coming into force in Wales and across the United Kingdom.

And you can see, we have a lot of spindles here.

And making one, we've now got hundreds...

All driven by a single belt drive on this lovely long shaft there

that really covers the entire factory.

It is so simple, and yet, it is genius. It is genius, really.

But, of course, destroys the livelihood

of my great, great grandfather.

Yeah, well... This one has 400 spindles.

And it doesn't tire. And it doesn't want to go on strike.

No, and you'd often only have two people running this machine.

-So that's a good few hundred hand spinners out of work.

-That's right.

And initially, when you had machines like this and other machines

coming into play in the early 19th century

groups like the Luddites would go round

smashing up these machines because, quite rightly,

they saw it as a real threat to their livelihood.

The Luddites may have taken direct action to try and destroy

machines like these, but what of Thomas and his family?

Their fate would also be sealed by this revolution.

But before John learns of this, he can't resist seeing

this extraordinary spinning machine in action.

You'll see this machine works in the same way

as that wheel used to - it moves out.

And it's just... These spindles put that twist and spin into it,

and it moves back in.

Can we actually get it running?

-Yeah, sure. Get it going now.

-Let's have a look.

As a keen amateur engineer himself, John is definitely in his element.

What do we do?

So, we're just going to slot that, slide it across.

And then slide this one?

-Yeah, there you go.

-Across?

So just how did this revolution, ushered in by this spinning machine,

affect John's great great grandfather Thomas Humphreys and his family?

By 1851 Thomas Humphreys had moved to Pontardawe near Swansea.

Still at the Wool Museum, historian Hedd Ladd Lewis can reveal more.

-Very, very interestingly, we have the 1861 census here.

-Right.

And if we look very closely, we see Thomas Humphreys here.

-That is.

-The head.

And he now owns a woollen factory.

So the man who was born in poverty...

now employs five men in a woollen factory.

-Very good.

-He's taken advantage of his situation, obviously his skills

and he now, in Pontardawe, owns a woollen factory.

Good for him.

Which is a wonderful story in itself, isn't it?

-Extraordinary achievement.

-Yes, and...

we've found a photograph of his mill.

How wonderful!

And you can see, it's at the edge of the stream.

-Yes, yes.

-And you can see the building here.

It's a very early photograph.

What a remarkable fellow.

And if we move on to...

Slater's Commercial Directory of 1871...

Yes, so this is ten years after we've discovered

-that he's become a mill owner.

-Yes.

Well, he's now also a beer retailer.

Now, if you can imagine, Pontardawe, in the Swansea Valley...

It was developing by then, there were coal mines,

there were factories.

And, of course, there were a lot of thirsty workers.

Very, very good.

So, here we have an individual who's taking advantage

again of the situation.

-See a need, fill it.

-He's seen a need and he's now a beer retailer...

as well.

I hope he's not the man that waters the miners' beer, though.

We can but hope.

But further down the line, at the end of the 1870s,

he also owned a candle factory.

Good lord!

Thomas and his wife Mary had nine children.

But in the midst of this great business success,

Mary died aged just 46.

In later life, Thomas would re-marry

and Hedd has this marriage certificate.

He was 78 by now and his wife was 72.

But what's interesting, if you remember back

when we looked at his marriage certificate, he was illiterate.

That's right, yes.

-He's now signing his own name.

-Good lord!

That is wonderful, isn't it?

-And he's got a fine hand too.

-Yes.

So he's now taught himself to read and write as well.

Very, very good.

That is wonderful.

What a remarkable man.

Still on his mother's side of the family tree,

John is travelling back another generation.

He believes there may be someone who was

a clockmaker amongst his ancestors.

And now he's about to find out if this could be true.

Rees Hopkin was John's great-great-great-grandfather.

Born in 1797 in the village of Llanarthney near Carmarthen.

He was the son of a farmer.

Wool had made Carmarthen prosperous and with this wealth

came the demand for other trades, including watch and clock making.

John's hoping Carmarthenshire County Museum may be able

to give him some insight into the clockmaking business.

If Rees was a clockmaker, he would typically

have started his working life as an indentured apprentice.

Historian Ed Cloutman can tell John something

about how this indenture would have worked.

You were taken by your father to see your future master clockmaker.

The two of them would have signed an indenture

and on signing that, the clockmaker would have promised

to teach you the art of clockmaking.

Typically, the apprenticeship would have lasted seven years.

During his apprenticeship,

he would have had to have known how to make all the individual bits.

-Yes, yes.

-Because, for instance, if he had a damaged wheel,

then he would have had to know how to put in new teeth.

At this time, many of the parts were made by hand,

requiring great skill from the apprentices.

John lost the top from his finger

whilst attempting some of his own amateur engineering

and really admires the skills of these early clockmakers.

But what of his relative, Rees Hopkin, did he make clocks?

Ed has managed to track him down.

Rees Hopkin and he was a master clockmaker.

Apprenticed in 1814.

So he would have had an indenture

and in 1814 that would have been granted to him...

..as a qualified clockmaker.

You'll need a few more fingers than I seem to have got at the moment.

It's great... It's a great craft.

Shortly, John will be learning of a colourful character

on his father Rhys Davies' side of the family tree,

but before that he's heading even further back in the mists of time,

to Carreg Cennen Castle in Camarthenshire.

It was here, in the 15th century, that two opposing families -

the Lancastrians and the Yorkists -

did battle in a war to settle the throne of England.

In this, "the War of the Roses",

Carreg Cennen played an important role.

John has been researching the events that took place here

because of a family legend.

The story tells that John's Welsh ancestors were caught up

on both sides of this battle.

He's here with Ammanford historian Terry Norman

to see if there could be any truth in this family legend.

Is there any...?

Any justification at all for that, as far as your research...?

Well, it's highly possible

because most of the landowners here were Lancastrians,

but during that period where the Yorkists were on the throne,

-many of them changed allegiances.

-Yeah.

People switched from Lancastrian to Yorkist and back again.

Very much so.

Unless you were one of the major landowners - major gentry -

-you profited very little out of it.

-Yes.

Yes, it's highly possible.

In the battle that raged here,

the Lancastrians lost Carreg Cennen Castle to the Yorkists

and, deemed to be too much of a threat,

the castle was later partly demolished

by the Yorkist men, leaving it the dramatic ruin it is today.

These were dangerous and violent times, whichever side you were on.

But it was not a time to be...

You know, to be a peasant, is it?

No, not at all.

Every major family lost one, two, three sons.

The amount of remarrying people who had killed somebody you know.

-That's right.

-Plenty of the nobility remarried the man

-who might have killed their father or their husband.

-Yes.

Well, it's about alliances and it's about preserving the family.

And preserving the family's lands and estates

and hopefully making the right alliances that will grow.

But it's nice to know

that the Ammanford region played its little part.

Now John is travelling off to meet with Mike Churchill-Jones

in the centre of Ammanford.

He's here to learn of someone on his father's side of the family tree.

John always admired the moral courage of his dad, Rhys Davies,

but sadly the same cannot be said

of his great-great, grandfather Evan Davies.

A shoemaker.

He married Esther Davies in Llansawel, Carmarthenshire

but by 1841, was living a long way from home.

Can you read where?

-Stockport?

-Stockport.

Good heavens.

Well, basically, it looks to me as if he's moved -

could be for work reasons.

He's taken up with...

a young lady called Mary.

-I can't find a marriage.

-Oh, right, right, right.

He's left poor old Esther in Llansawel...

And gone off with another woman.

In Stockport. Could he get far enough away?

Well, yes, well.

So there's no... Obviously there was no divorce in those days.

-Not for them anyway.

-Indeed.

HE EXCLAIMS IN WELSH

But this appears not to be Evan's ONLY extra family.

But in 1861...

..we find Evan Davies is here again.

He's now with a lady called Ellen.

He's calling her his wife,

she's not his wife, there is no marriage.

She has, with her, two illegitimate children.

Ha!

And she's actually 28 years younger than him.

Sin!

Sin, every one of them sinners.

I can describe him as the man...

who's the non-bigamist really,

he made sure he didn't become a bigamist by getting married...

-again.

-Oh, so he didn't actually marry?

He didn't marry these two ladies, he just called them his wife.

And he had two children with the first one.

It's caught up with him, he died two years after that.

He died in Stockport in 1863.

But not in prison.

Not in prison, no.

But he is buried in the Municipal Cemetery in...

-In Stockport?

-In Stockport, yes.

I will have to go look up the old sinner next time I'm in Stockport.

-Indeed, why not?

-Very good, very good.

Finally, John is on the trail of the family closet to him.

He knew his maternal grandmother Sarah-Emily very well,

but never knew his grandfather William

and has always wanted to know more of HIS story.

William worked in the Amman Valley as a coal miner during World War II.

To see what working conditions were like,

John's come to visit the Neath Colliery Museum.

Historian Nigel Bevan has been researching William's story.

What exactly did my grandfather do?

He was a rider, which meant that he was working in transport.

Now, at that time, coal was pretty much moved around underground,

and above ground, in trams.

-Right, yes.

-Trucks like this.

-Yes.

They'd be linked together into a chain,

-a journey of drams as it was called.

-Right.

And the man responsible for moving them was the rider.

So, William would have been moving coal supplies in drams

underground and above ground.

These things were derailed very easily, the rails were often uneven.

They were heavy to get back on a rail

and they were difficult to control if they started moving too fast.

By 1939 and the outbreak of World War II,

William was now aged 50,

but there would be no let-up in the physical demands of his work.

Throughout the war, 200 million tonnes of coal each year

was required by the government, to keep the country running

and power the factories needed for the war effort.

William was to old to be conscripted into the regular forces

and would spend his war toiling to supply

the ever-increasing demand for South Wales coal.

Second World War was a very difficult time

for the mine industry in Britain.

Coal was very much the bedrock of the war economy.

Coal was one of the vital ingredients for steelmaking.

All those ships that were needed, the tanks, the vehicles,

the weapons that were needed to fight the war depended on coal.

1939, we still had 135,000 miners working underground in coal mines.

-It was big business.

-Yes, yes.

But the industry was in very, very bad shape.

After Germany had occupied France and taken over their coal fields,

Welsh coal was all the more vital and as demand surged,

so conditions underground became ever more difficult.

So what of John's grandfather William?

In the winding room of Neath Colliery Museum,

John can learn more of the details of his grandfather's life,

with genealogist Mike Churchill-Jones.

It appears, like John,

his grandfather was also something of a performer.

You've obviously been learning about your grandfather William's

-experiences in Ammanford Colliery.

-William Henry, yes.

-Yes, and especially during the war.

-Mm-hm.

-As you are aware, he died before you was born.

-That's right.

Mike can reveal that William was a leading singer

with Ammanford and District Choral Society.

"He took a keen interest in singing and possessed a sweet tenor voice."

Sadly, Michael also has more to share with John

and the reason why he never got to meet his grandfather William

with that sweet tenor voice.

"Victim of colliery accident.

"We deeply regret to announce the death,

"which occurred at the Morriston Emergency Hospital...

"of Mr William...

"Henry Jones, 28 High Street.

"Deceased.

"Was a rider employed at the Ammanford Colliery.

"Received serious injuries when he was crushed between trams.

"During many years of employment underground,

"he had met with eight major accidents."

Despite being involved in these eight, separate mining accidents,

William went back to work in the mines each time.

He clearly was a brave man, doing his bit for the war effort.

"Aged about 52 years.

"He leaves a widow and family.

"The funeral takes place today, Thursday."

-Very tragic end for him.

-Yes, yes.

What's your thoughts on those eight previous accidents?

"EIGHT major accidents."

Well, you know, it was...

I mean, it was really difficult.

It was hard work

and he would have been working pretty solidly

during those war years in particular,

trying to put in the extra hours

to get the coal out of the ground and...

It's when you're tired those wretched accidents happen.

William's death certificate...

officially records he died from shock.

And they put it down as shock.

Perhaps they thought he was recovering and then...

the shock kicked in.

After the war, the bravery of William,

like so many of the miners of that generation,

would receive no formal recognition,

no posthumous medal or memorial.

William's wartime sacrifice would be forgotten

by all, but his widow Sarah...

..and now the full story has finally been shared with her grandson John.

William is a hero, isn't he, in his own way.

He's working at the age of 52/53 doing manual work

that is backbreakingly hard, he's working long hours,

especially because it's part of the war effort.

The amount of coal that's been taken out of the mine is dropping

and the only way to compensate it is to get more for men...

More out of the mines by men.

Basically, it's an exchange, isn't it?

We plant men in the ground in return

for a diminishing amount of black gold.

John's journey into this Welsh ancestry is coming to an end.

It's been an emotional return to Ammanford and to Wales,

after many years of working and travelling the world over.

John's grandmother, Sarah-Emily, continued to live out her days

in Ammanford and it's in Ammanford, that he wants to end his journey,

to say hello and goodbye to some very special people.

He's here to pay his respects to his parents.

And here they are, Mum and Dad.

My father...

I loved so much.

And my mother... Well, frankly...

it was her determination that I should not be...

That I should rise a class into the middle class.

For Rhys and Phyllis, from their son John,

who owes them everything.

With John's journey now at an end,

how does he feel about his experience of Coming Home?

Well, I want to thank you guys for...

having me on the show...

It's been an eye-opener, a revelation and...

It's pretty marvellous, isn't it?

It is a coming home, and one realises the...

The strength...

..and endurance and stamina of our people.

I'm very proud of those Welsh boys and girls.

They did well, those people.

Now it's up to me.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd