DAVIES
,
WILLIAM
(
1805
-
1859
),
Independent minister and schoolmaster
;
b.
20 March 1805
at
Pant-ysgyfarnog
in
Llan-y-crwys, Carms.
, was educated first at
Castell Hywel
and then (after
keeping school
for six months at
Ffald-y-brenin
in his native parish) at
Carmarthen Academy
(
1826-30
), where he showed considerable
linguistic and mathematical ability
. He ministered for a few years (seemingly not too successfully) in
Cornwall
, being ordained (
1832
) at
Helford
and living at
Truro
; but ill health compelled him to return home in
1834
. In
1835
he became
tutor
to the children of a
land surveyor
named
Davies
, at ‘
Froodvale
’ (in
Welsh
,
Ffrwd-y-fâl
) in
Llansawel
, who built him a school-house which became quite famous as the seat of a preparatory school for aspirants to the ministry; the school elicited one of the very few laudatory reports of the
royal commission
of
1846
(
Report
, i, 227).
Davies
also
preached
in the chapels of the district, and from
1841 to 1856
was
pastor
of a small congregation founded in
1840
by an uncle of his at
Parc-y-rhos
in
Pencarreg
parish. He was an unattractive
preacher
, and was suspected (incorrectly) of
Unitarianism
, partly because of the aridly academic nature of his discourses but more because he was
persona grata
among the
Unitarians
and acted annually as
examiner
at
Carmarthen Academy
; his fairly copious writing all appeared in orthodox
Independent
periodicals. But he was undoubtedly a most capable
teacher
, and his scholarship was sound; he received in
1842
a complimentary
Ph.D.
degree from
Germany
— the university is not specified, but the fact is attested by one who had seen the diploma. At the end of
1854
he removed from
Ffrwd-y-fâl
to
Troed-y-rhiw
(
Allt-Walis
), again
combining a family
tutorship
with a private school; but in
1856
he was appointed
Hebrew and mathematical tutor
at
Carmarthen Academy
. He d. at
Carmarthen
,
11 Dec. 1859
; he was buried in the graveyard of
Elim Independent chapel
,
Ffynnon-ddrain
. His not immodest judgement upon himself was that
‘his only eminence consisted in his tact as a teacher.’
Bibliography:
-
Autobiographical fragment printed by
G. Eyre Evans
in no. 31 of his
Antiquarian Notes
, London,
1898-1906
;
-
Hanes Eglwysi Annibynnol Cymru
, iv, 95-6 (inexact);
-
Geirlyfr Bywgraffiadol o Enwogion
Cymru
, 1870
(with amusing reminiscences).
Author:
Emeritus Professor Robert Thomas Jenkins, C.B.E., D.Litt., Ll.D.,
F.S.A., (1881-1969), Bangor
