CARDIFF CHURCHES THROUGH TIME
In September 2018, Cowbridge U3A History group was fortunate to welcome knowledgeable author Jean Rose, who gave an illustrated presentation on ‘Cardiff Churches through Time’, a fascinating guide to the capital’s places of worship.
The small Norman town of Cardiff had two churches: the parish church was St Mary’s, near the river, which fell into disrepair and is now only remembered by an outline in bricks on a wall of the ‘Prince of Wales’ pub, and its chapel of ease, the present St John the Baptist church near the market. This is the only medieval building in the centre of Cardiff, other than the castle.
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Llandaff was incorporated into Cardiff in 1922, so Llandaff Cathedral, constructed in the 12th century on the site of an earlier church, qualifies as one of the city’s places of worship. The cathedral had fallen into decay by the early 18th century (it was a relatively poor see), but was saved from destruction by restoration work on the eastern side, although the western half remained in ruins.
A full transformation of the cathedral began in the late 1840s, thanks to the ‘black gold’ (coal) that was bringing wealth to Cardiff. The church now had a tower and a tower with a spire.
In January 1941, the cathedral was severely damaged when a parachute mine was dropped, blowing the roof off the nave, south aisle and chapter house. The bombs weren’t sectarian; the Roman Catholic cathedral in the centre of Cardiff was also badly damaged by an incendiary and Eglwys Dewi Sant, for Welsh speakers, was completely destroyed during the 1941 blitz.
Major restorations and reconfigurations were subsequently carried out on Llandaff Cathedral and the building was back in use by June 1958.
The church of St Margaret of Antioch in Roath has its origins as a Norman chapel of ease (marriages, burials or baptisms could not be carried out there), but as the parish population rose from 250 to 60,000 over the second half of the 19th century, the building proved totally inadequate.
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The present church was constructed with colourful tiles, Penarth alabaster and bricks, but for some reason the elegant tower and spire in the design were not built. The church eventually got a squat tower in the 1920s.
St Margaret’s contains the Bute mausoleum, the only site in Wales where some members of the Bute family lie buried, in large, slab tombs, reminiscent of Tsarist tombs in St Petersburg. The first Marquis had married ‘rich, ugly’ Miss Charlotte Windsor, an heiress to land in Cardiff, the Vale and, eventually, most importantly, the north of Glamorgan, with its vast mineral deposits. To prove he was good at marrying wealth, if not managing it, his second wife was another heiress, Frances Coutts.
St German’s Church in Adamsdown, opened in 1884 and now with the only flying buttresses in Cardiff, was described as the ‘finest Victorian church in Wales’.
’Tin tabernacles’ (made of corrugated iron galvanised with zinc) were cheap buildings that could be constructed by parishioners to use as temporary churches before more permanent structures were installed. St Thomas’s in Birchgrove is the only survivor in Cardiff.
Womanby Street, one of the oldest in Cardiff, was the site of Trinity, the first non-conformist chapel, built in 1697.
Bethany Baptist Chapel, with origins from the beginning of the 19th century, became hemmed in by Howell’s department store (now 'House of Fraser' and due to close), which eventually purchased the church. The arcade arches, the apse and the west frontage were preserved within the store.
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A memorial plaque to Rawlins White, a fisherman of Cardiff, martyred by burning at the stake in 1555, can also be seen by shoppers.
Several churches have disappeared during Cardiff’s developments, demolished to make way for office blocks or shopping centres. Others have closed because of dwindling congregations and now have other uses.
The variety of churches that remain is a reminder of the phenomenal growth of Cardiff in the 19th century, when a small town grew into the largest coal port in the world. Once they dominated the skyline, but now, hidden in the city sprawl, they are often overlooked by residents and tourists alike.
Jean Rose is certainly determined to make them visible again.
Steve Monaghan