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Speech on being made a Freeman of Barry
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Mr Mayor, Alderman, Councillors and Burgesses,
Friends.
I am deeply moved by the signal and distinguished honour
you have conferred on me today, the greatest that I have ever received.
If I were to analyse my emotions I think that three
feelings are uppermost in my mind, gratitude, pride and humility.
I am profoundly grateful to you, Mr. Mayor and the members of the
corporation of Barry, who have been so gracious in your desire to do me
this conspicuous honour and I appreciate your very kind thought
more than I can express in words.
I thank you too very warmly for the beautiful casket in
which the scroll is enclosed and greatly appreciate the work of the
proctor who designed it so artistically. Also Mr R.A. Jones, the
craftsman at St Fagan’s Folk Museum who has executed it so skilfully. I
am very grateful to the Town Clerk for all the rouble and care he has
taken for all the arrangements for this ceremony.
I find it difficult to express adequately my appreciation
of the exceptionally kind and generous words of the two Councillors who
have proposed and seconded the resolutions. The pleasure that the
conferring of the Freedom gives me is enhanced by the fact that the two
speakers were Old Boys of mine for whom I have a great regard.
May I say in passing what gratification it is to me to
realise the ever increasing part Old Barrians, men and women, are taking
part in the Public Life as Borough and County Councillors and as Members
of the House of Commons.
As I listen to the generous words I was tempted to ask
myself if indeed it was I that was the object of such praise, and I feel
very humble. For I realise more than anyone else can, that any service I
may have rendered the town of Barry would have been impossible but for
the invaluable help and support of others and this service has been a
pleasure. An Old Persian proverb says, “The best days of a man’s life
are those in which he has rendered service”. And I have found it so,
and have always appreciated the privilege of taking part in the work of
education in Barry.
Of those who have helped me may I first say how glad I am
that my wife is with me to share this honour and that a tribute has been
paid to her. She has always been a source of inspiration and a helpful
critic.
Secondly I am conscious that this tribute is in part paid
to me as representative of education and should like to pass on part of
the honour to two groups of the teachers of Barry , my old staff of the
county School and the Primary teachers of the town.
The conspicuous successes of Old Barry Boys and Girls
have been due to the exceptionally brilliant teaching abilities of the
most loyal staff that any headmaster has been fortunate to have as
colleagues; their self-sacrificing devotion in managements of their
duties - Old Barrians will remember with gratitude
Barry from its earliest days has been most fortunate too
in the staffs of the Primary Schools and the excellent grounding our
pupils receive in these schools has had a great share in the success of
our scholars. I have always been grateful to the Heads and staffs for
the valuable cooperation that has existed between us and the cordial
friendships I have formed with many of them.
From the Primary Schools throughout the years have come
boys and girls of good abilities, many of exceptional calibre, whom it
has been a pleasure to teach. And it is most gratifying to learn of
their striking achievements in so may varied careers.
Our old students are scattered all over the globe and I
have recently had visitors or received letters from British Guiana whose
Governor we are proud to claim as an old Barrian, from Jamaica, New
Zealand, Australia, Rhodesia, British Somaliland, India and other
countries and we have with us today one of my oldest Old Boys returned
after nearly 40 years Missionary Service in West Africa and even from a
Leper Colony in Nigeria.
Nothing gives me greater pleasure in my old age than the
great kindness shown me by Old Barrians and the mutual affection that
exists between us. My other feeling is very naturally one of great
pride in being made a Honorary Freeman of Barry, a pride which is the
greater as I follow such worthy and distinguished predecessors, the
recent death of the last of whom Mr J Meggett, Barry deeply mourns.
For as a resident of over 50 years I love the town and
can say in the proud words of St, Paul about his home town, Tarsus, I am
a citizens of no mean City”. Barry is a town to be proud of both for its
natural beauty of its position and its surroundings, its historical
associations and advantages and amenities provided through the vision
and wisdom of the civic authorities
With the Psalms we can say” Our lies are fallen unto us
pleasant places. Yea we have a goodly heritage.” How nobly placed it is
above the shores of the Severn Sea! My favourite walk is along the cliff
edge from Min-y-Mor, Porth y Castell to the Golden Stairs’, and as on a
Summers day I gaze below the lovely Bay of Porth Kerry and the wooded
headland beyond, the words of our old Anglo-Welsh poet, Sir Lewis
Morris, who once honoured the School at a Speech Day, often comes to
mind, “Beyond the Silvan Cliffs the innumerable laughter of the sea”.
We are generally inclined to regard Barry as a modern
town and of course it is in many ways. But I like to remind myself and
others that there are few areas in Wales in which areas in Wales in
which are concentrated so many links with the past especially in realm
of learning and religion are to be found in the district of which Barry
is in the centre.
I am sometimes tempted to imagine that in some mysterious
way a tradition of learning has come down the centuries to the present
day in this corner of the Vales.
If we carry our minds back to the Age of the Saints in
the 6th Century we can with considerable certainty imagine
the Saints from the Monastic centre at Llancarvan, Cadoc, Dyfan and
Barruc making Barry Island or more probably what was then Porth Kerry
Haven s a base for their missionary journeys.
Then the legend of the Normans landing in Porth Kerry
Haven -now parkland – is in no way improbable. For Barry Castle Gateway,
a precious ruin which deserves preservation – is but one of ruined
Norman castles within 20 miles of Barry.
Another fact which strikes one’s imagination are the
local witnesses to the Church Building enthusiasm that follw in the wake
of the Norman journey in the imagination around the circle of Mediaeval
churches mostly13th century that form a ring in and around Barry mostly
13th century within a radius of 2 miles from this Hall:
starting from Sully Church, north-west to Cadoxton, then to Methyr Dovan,
then to the ruined highlight Church, then Porth Kerry and old St
Nicholas and to complete the circle the ruined monastic chapel on the
Island.
Such are but a few of our historic association. I like
to think that Barry is still a centre of culture and learning.
The first time I head of Barry Dock was in August 1888. I
was travelling by train to Penarth when we were passing and a fellow
passenger said, “They are building a new dock down that line”.
I little imagined then that in about 10 years time I
would be appointed Head of its Intermediate School.
When I arrived on March1st 1899 the ground plan of Barry
had already been well established. But Barry had in that short time
gained two reputations. First, its dock with its deepwater entrance was
the most impressive in the country and was exporting more coal than any
British Port.
I and an intimate knowledge of the dock in those days,
for as Sub Mariners of the Royal Engineers under Colonel Arthur Hughes
in the month of August each year we daily sailed out and in the dock at
all states of the tides to lay our practice mines in Sully Bay and I
well remember the fine sight of the dock crowded with ships. May
similar conditions soon return?
Barry’s second reputation was in the unique character of
its primary Schools. For members of Barry School Board were men of
vision who were the first in the country who realised the prime
necessities of a good primary education.
1. A staff of first class teachers.
2. Good buildings.
3. Smaller classes
And they were certainly achieved
Many of its members were also members of my school
Governors and I owe them , especially their Chairman a deep debt of
gratitude for unceasing kindness and encouragement.
I should like to mention by name honoris causa
some of these Pioneers of Barry Education. Mr John Lowdon, Chairman of
the Governors, or nearly 30 years, Dr Lloyd Edwards, Dr. O’Donnell,
Captain Davies, the dock master, Councillor J.H.Jose,
Mr. J.C.Meggett and later Reverends Ben Evans,
D.H.Williams, Rector H.Stewart and Mr Dudley Howe.
Some of their sons and daughters are with us here today
and have reason to be proud of their relatives’ noble pioneering work.
It is a pleasure to realise that their successors have
well carried on the work of these pioneers and progress in many aspects
of civic life, marks their aims and ambitions.
When Barry became a borough it selected for its selected
for its motto with the Welsh words : Cyfiawnder, Caderned, Cynnydd
Justice, strength and stability, progress.
In expressing my deep and real gratitude to the Borough
of Barry for this exceptional honour I cannot conclude better than by
expressing the wish that justice and righteousness may prevail in its
court in all its pubic life, that stability and strength may
characterise its commerce, industry and religious life which has marked
Barry’s history in the past may in the future continue and increase.
Pob llwydd a bendith i dref y barri
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The Casket made by Richard Albert Jones
From the Welsh Paper 'Y Faners' 30th April
1982 Iorweth Peate wrote on the Craftsmen of Wales
Richard Albert Jones of Llangurig, Montgomryshire learnt
his trade as a carpenter from his father but later worked in London. He
was the first craftsman to be appointed on the staff of the Folk Museum
in St. Fagan’s in 1947.
The borough of Barry decided when Edgar Jones, the former
famous Headmaster of the county School was given the Freedom of Barry,
it was obligatory to have skilfully made casket of oak with an inlay of
a silver-plate (actually it is bronze) with Dada’s initial in enamel for
the inscription.
“I consulted with Albert and as I thought he agreed at
once to fashion the chest. He had a piece of dark oak that had been
dried years ago. During the course of the day at that time up to 4
o’clock, he would work at the heavy task of raising a fence of boards in
the wooded part of the estates digging and putting in posts making a
fence on which to nail the boards heavy difficult work. Then he went to
the back of the work shop and after a cup of tea when most of the staff
had finished for the day he would work for 2-3 hours on the casket – no
longer a carpenter and fence builder, but a skilful joiner making an
artistic work of art. Before week had passed the casket with its lining
of blue velvet was finished; an achievement which could not have been
bettered.”
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