Davies
is one of those nightmare names for Genealogists. In some parts of the
English-speaking world, Smith or Jones may be the most common surname,
but in many parts of our ancestors' native Glamorgan, there is no doubt
about which name claims this dubious distinction! So it is not
surprising that members of other, unrelated, Davies families, crossed
the paths of our ancestors and, in several cases, intermarried with them.
We shall concentrate
here on five other Davies families; one definitely related to our
ancestors, but not to the main line of Davieses; one which I had
thought was related because they had close dealings with the Rhondda
Davies ancestors, but after a good deal of research proved not to be;
two possibly related, and requiring further research; and two of
several connected to our tree through marriage.
The first Davies
family we shall look at started out as most, if not all, other Davieses
probably did - as the surname DAVID (that, in turn, being derived
through Welsh patronymic naming tradition, from the Christian name
David). The difference here, is that it happened relatively recently
(ie in the nineteenth century) so we are able to confirm it readily
through the records. One of the sons of David David and Gwenllian Llewellyn, our
great great great grandparents, was named Evan David (#1723). Evan
seems to have been plagued throughout his life by curates, parish
clerks and census enumerators with poor handwriting - he was baptised
as DAVIES, and most of his siblings were baptised as DAVIS, although
his parents' surname was DAVID. When he married Elizabeth Loveluck
(#770) in 1838, he was clearly Evan DAVID in the records, and their
daughter Ann and eldest son David were both baptised as DAVID; also the
1841 census shows the family as DAVID. Having moved to Cwmdare around
1850, the first census there (1851) shows the family as DAVIS, but
thereafter, in all subsequent censuses, parish and adminitrative
records and tombstone inscriptions, the family appears as DAVIES, the
surname that Evan and Elizabeth's children appear to have adopted and
carried forward. It is likely that, in the rapidly expanding Rhondda,
where those with the surname DAVIES far outnumbered those with the
'old' name DAVID, Evan and Elizabeth
may have tired of constantly correcting those who got their name wrong,
and decided to adopt DAVIES to simplify the lives of their children!
One of those children, Anne Davies (#2377) and her husband John
Griffiths emigrated to Pennsylvania, U.S.A., and it is from one of
their great great grandchildren, Lynne Davis
of British Columbia, that I have received most of the data in the
database relating to this branch of the family. Lynne and I are fourth
cousins once removed.
I spent some time gathering
information on, and tracing the origins of another well-known Rhondda
Davies family, that of Dr. Henry Naunton Davies, son of surgeon Evan
Davies, whose sons and grandsons also qualified as doctors and many
remained and practiced in the Rhondda valleys. Although there seem to
have been very close ties between the two families, Henry Naunton
Davies' grandfather, David Naunton, having been the first preacher at
the Libanus Chapel opened on our ancestor's land at Cwmsaerbren, and he
and his family seemingly spending a great deal of time at Cwmsaerbren,
I have not yet found a blood link to our direct line of ancestors,
although I have established a connection by marriage to the other side
of our family - Dr.Evan Naunton Davies, son of Dr.Henry Naunton Davies,
married Martha Jane Thomas, a great granddaughter of my 3x great
grandfather Gwilim Thomas of Llangeinor, and research continues. See the database entries on the Naunton Davies family.
Another early Rhondda Davies, the
Rev.Thomas Davies, the charismatic and controversial "Red Priest of the
Rhondda" was not a direct ancestor of ours, but as he was almost
certainly descended from the same "Glorans" of the Upper Rhondda
Valleys, it is likely that he was related to our ancestors (in fact,
one document I have found suggests that he was probably the brother of
William Davies alias Hopkin). Until further evidence comes to light to
confirm the connection, however, and I am sure of the precise
relationship of this 'cousin' to our main line ancestors, I shall
refrain from including him in the database. If and when this point is
reached, I shall incorporate into the Family History some of the
fascinating anecdotes I have discovered about his life and preaching,
not all of them to his credit. As ecclesiastical historian Canon
William Lewis writes in his book Cwm Rhondda and the Red Priest: "In
most circles, and especially in some religious ones, he is reputed to
have been a bad-tempered autocrat whose behaviour was frequently, to
say the least, hardly consistent with his calling".
I shall mention here
just two of several other Davies families connected by marriage to our
family tree, they being the ancestors of two fellow-researchers, Jill
Muir and Robert Wilkins, who are, themselves, cousins, but these are
two separate, unrelated Davies families - gets complicated doesn't
it?!. One is the family of David Davies of Llantrisant, great great
grandfather of fellow researcher Robert Wilkins, who has provided most of the data in the database relating to this branch of the family. David Davies married Margaret Bevan
of Llwynypia Farm, whose sister Sarah married William Davies (#560),
one of the Cwmsaerbren Davies family. Another of those sisters, Elizabeth Bevan married Thomas Davies, great great grandfather of Jill Muir, who has similarly provided me with most of the detail contained in the database for this, the family of Benjamin Davies from Cardigan.
