Welsh Journals

WALES. Vol. II] MAY, 1895. [No. 13. JOSEPH EDWARDS, SCULPTOR. By William Davies (Mynorydd). II. Teach me to love and to forgive. Exact my own defects to scan, What others are, to feel, And know myself a man.—Gray. „( MONGST the manuscripts kindly lent me I find, in Joseph Edwards' own hand-writing, some elaborate details of his ped igree; but many of them are of a purely local character, of but little interest to the Trfdl" general reader. I have com¬ pressed them into a few quotations, but sufficient, I trust, to prove that there is no evidence that traverses the statements concerning heredity in my in¬ troductory chapter. " My paternal great-grandfather was Joseph Edwards of Llantrisant, Glamor¬ ganshire, who married Margery Davydd, Llanwynno .... Their eldest son John, my grandfather, lived at Pen-y-Lan, near Merthyr...... He married Elizabeth Yorath of Mynydd Islwyn .... My great-grandfather pos¬ sessed some house property in Llantrisant, but he left his house, on some business in France, and was never heard of more. His Widow Margery died, and her sons left the Neighbourhood in deep distress, and re¬ moved to Pen-y-Lan. The property was Subsequently lost to the family through their want of means to get some title deeds from the hands of a mortgagee. William Johns of Cardiff, in 1853, gave me par¬ ticulars of this transaction. He maintained Pedigree. that injustice had been done to the family. Mr. John was at this time a very old man, eighty two years of age .... " My maternal grandmother was a near relative of Mrs. Griffiths of Aberdare, whose grandmother lived at the Grawen Farm, Cefn Coed Cymmer .... Somehow by intermarriage, so Mrs. Griffiths told me, I was, along one line, her second cousin, but along another line, I was her nephew ! . . . . " My maternal grandfather removed from Pen-y-Lan to Ynysgau, Merthyr, in order to be nearer his work, which was at Gyfarthfa .... My own parents lived at Ynysgau, and it was there I was born on March 5th, 1814." When Joseph was seven years old he was sent to a school kept by the Rev. J. B. Evans, pastor at Ynysgau chapel, where the boys mother was a faithful member. * He afterwards went to George Williams' school in the Glebeland, and lastly to an evening class kept by David Williams of George Town. He was not very studious then, being so fond of play,—but he soon began to help his father in stone-cutting, now and then amusing himself with drawing, painting, carving, and even playing a little on the harp. In sculpture he copied a medallion of Lord Byron, in white marble, and a child asleep, in stone. These two early works were given, long afterwards, to Lady Charlotte Guest. 13 * I am enabled to give some particulars of his early life through the kindness of Mr. Charles Wilkins of Merthyr, who has for¬ warded me his biographical notes published in the CardiJ' limes in a series of articles dating from August 7th, 1863. 193