The Cardiff Book of Days (18 page)

1959:
The pilot and three passengers died when their twin-engine aircraft crashed on North Road, close to Blackwater Playing Fields where 400 schoolboys were enjoying a sports day. The plane, owned by the Lec Refrigeration Company of Bognor Regis, had taken off from Sophia Gardens where the Ideal Home Exhibition was being held. The plane exploded as it hit a parked van. No one on the ground was injured but it took firemen half an hour to control the fierce flames and then recover the bodies. One person who had a lucky escape was
South Wales Echo
reporter Sonia Jones who was not allowed to fly because she was not insured. (John O'Sullivan & Bryn Jones,
Cardiff: A Centenary Celebration
, The History Press, 2005)

1917:
The first limbless soldier was admitted to the Prince of Wales Red Cross Hospital, Cardiff. The hospital was also the first to fit two artificial arms to an injured war veteran. (Stewart Williams,
Cardiff Yesterday
)

1953:
Boxer Joe Erskine from Cardiff beat Dick Richardson (Newport) in a heavyweight bout at Maindy Stadium, watched by 30,000 people. (Stewart Williams,
Cardiff Yesterday
)

1973:
Cardiff General Station was renamed Cardiff Central. ‘General' was a suffix used by the pre-nationalisation Great Western Railway for the principal station in a town or city. (Stewart Williams,
Cardiff Yesterday
)

1983:
Jubilant crowds invade the pitch as Cardiff City secure promotion from the Third Division by beating Leyton Orient 2-0. Cardiff's first goal had followed a surge upfield following confident Orient appeals for a penalty for handball at the other end. This was the second time in eight years that relegation had been followed by promotion in the next season. (Dennis Morgan,
Farewell to Ninian Park
, 2008)

1648:
Fighting for the King in the second phase of the Civil War, 8,000 ‘country yokels who had never seen a battlefield in their lives' were comprehensively defeated by just 3,000 members of Parliament's New Model Army in the Battle of St Fagans. Their pikes, pitchforks and other farm tools were no match for the Roundhead cavalry and hardened and disciplined soldiers. According to local tradition, the fighting was so fierce that the River Ely ran red with blood. The Royalists, led by Major General Laugharne, a Presbyterian who had fallen out with Oliver Cromwell and switched sides, were routed and pursued west more than ten miles beyond Cowbridge. From the small village of St Fagans alone, sixty-five men were killed. Nearly 3,000 Royalists were taken prisoner. Two hundred and forty of them were transported to Barbados as slaves, but most were released on a pledge ‘never to engage again with the Parliament hereafter'. Four of their officers were executed and local Royalist families which had taken an active part in the battle were fined. (Dennis Morgan,
The Cardiff Story
, D. Brown & Sons, 1991)

1926:
Support for the General Strike was beginning to crumble. Cardiff tram drivers were told that they would lose their jobs unless they returned to work within twenty-four hours. More than 150 men reported back that day and they were soon followed by most of the rest. Other strikers, mainly railwaymen, set up picket lines but failed to stop the return to work. The General Strike ended on May 12th after a peace formula acceptable to the TUC was agreed but the miners held out for several more months. (John O'Sullivan & Bryn Jones,
Cardiff: A Centenary Celebration
, The History Press, 2005)

1945:
Cardiff celebrated the end of the war in Europe which had been announced by the BBC the day after the Germans had surrendered. The announcement came at midnight on May 8th and was relayed by tannoy to the crowds gathered outside the City Hall. As O'Sullivan & Jones describe, ‘it was the signal for 50,000 men, women and children to cheer, dance and sing the night away in front of the floodlit hall. Cardiff rejoiced as lights went on again after six years of miserable blackout.' (John O'Sullivan & Bryn Jones,
Cardiff: A Centenary Celebration
, The History Press, 2005)

1912:
The death of Alderman William Taylor, Mayor of Cardiff in 1886-7. He was a leading protagonist in the resistance to replace the historic name of Crockherbton with the less distinctive Queen Street (
see
March 14th). In 1901 his colleague J.H. Matthews, speaking to the Cardiff Naturalists Society described those modernists who perpetrated the deed as ‘vandals' saying ‘every fourth-rate market town has its Queen Street but Crockherbton was distinctive, ancient and historically interesting. It did not sound genteel enough for some of the shopkeepers, so it had to go'. Alderman Taylor was clearly a combative figure. In November 1889 he was voted off the Aldermen's Bench but contested the decision. He died at the age of 82 on board the P&O steam yacht
Vectis
and was buried at sea off the Adriatic island of Lissa. His wife and infant child who predeceased him are buried in the family grave at Cathays Cemetery. (Stewart Williams,
Cardiff Yesterday
)

1872:
The last broad gauge train ran in South Wales. In 1835, Brunel had advised the Great Western board that a gauge of 7ft be adopted for the railway to Bristol and Cardiff. This was despite the fact that most railways in Britain were adopting Stephenson's standard gauge of 4ft 8½ inches. This led to great inconvenience on cross-country journeys, especially where the two gauges met at places such as Gloucester. In 1846 a Gauge Commission was set up to consider the problem. Its members found that, although the broad gauge was superior in terms of speed, the standard gauge was more common (1,901 miles out of a total of 2,175) so suited the needs of a national system better. Gradually the GWR began to convert its routes to standard gauge, a process that was finally completed in 1892. (Stephen K. Jones,
Brunel in South Wales, Vol.2
, The History Press, 2006)

1897:
Guglielmo Marconi successfully transmitted the first wireless message across the water from Flat Holm to Lavernock Point. He had been taken over to the island on the tugboat
May
, operated by the Stevens family of Grangetown. (Stewart Williams,
Cardiff Yesterday
)

1874:
Susan Ann Gibbs was murdered by her husband James at St Mellons. Her decomposing body was not discovered until June 3rd. It had been hidden in a hedgerow at Hall Farm near Llanrumney. For years James Gibbs had strung along the infatuated Susan, wealthy but twenty-two years his senior – insisting on communicating only by letter – before finally marrying her on her home island of Jersey in July 1873. Even then he would not allow her to join him at Llanrumney Hall, where he was butler, claiming that his master would not countenance employing a married man. In fact he was carrying on an affair with a pretty young chorister named Mary Jones who lived at St Mellons. However, he suddenly appeared to relent and invited Susan to join him … (for the rest of this story,
see
May 28th and June 3rd).