Welsh Journals

Morgan and Mary Jenkins with eight oftheir nine children, c.1891. Left to right, back row: Tudor Morgan, Hannah Bertha, William David, Catherine Eliiabeth, John Howel. Front row: Mary, Glanddu (seated onfloor), Aneurin Ernest, Morgan, Irfon Gwessin. of Llanwrtyd Wells. It is thought that at some time he worked as a commercial traveller for a Birmingham wholesale warehouse, travelling to their customers by pony and trap in the mid-Wales area, and also in the Merthyr Tydfil district and neighbouring valleys. In 1860 he married Mary Jones, who came from Caio. Their first child, a daughter, Hannah, was born in Maesuchaf, Llanycrwys, near Lampeter, in 1862. After their fourth child, Elizabeth, was born in 1871 at Ffaldybrenin, the family moved to 40 Waterloo Street, in Swansea, at which address Morgan Jenkins commenced trading in 1870 as a wholesale draper and haberdasher on his own account. Their sixth child (of nine) and fourth son, Tudor Morgan, who was to play a major role in the firm, was born here in 1875. Of their other children, two elder sons, William (Bill) and Howel, started several wholesale drapery businesses in Cardiff. Howel ran a company called Manistre Jenkins & Co, among others. Bill was one of the founders of the successful concern, Finlay Jenkins & Co. Ltd. A younger son, Gwessin, became a very well known Presbyterian minister in East Ham, London, and President of the London Free Church Council. Another, Aneurin, after service with the British Red Crescent Mission during the Balkan Wars and, during World War I, as a medical officer in the Royal Flying Corps (forerunner of the RAF), became a G.P., also in east London. After living 'above the shop', Morgan, Mary and family moved twice to nearby areas of Swansea before they finally settled in a large three-storey terraced house near Argyle Chapel in St. Helen's Road. The attic rooms became a dormitory for