M23 Brian Davies

Review by Brian Davies

A Welsh Heretic, Dr. William Price, Llantrisant (1940) T. Islwyn Nicholas

Dr. William Price was one of the most remarkable individuals in Welsh nineteenth century history, and this is one of the most remarkable books in the rediscovery of that history in the twentieth century.

After Ness Edwards, who had written in the 1920s about the industrial revolution in South Wales and about the Chartists, Islwyn ap Nicholas must be given credit as the first writer to rescue from oblivion major episodes in the history of the Welsh people.

His first book was “One Hundred Years Ago: the story of the Montgomeryshire Chartists”, published in 1939 by Gwasg Y Seren Goch at Aberystwyth. Then he had three books published by Foyle's Welsh Press in London – first “A Welsh Heretic, Dr. William Price, Llantrisant” (1940), then “Dic Penderyn, Welsh Rebel and Martyr” (1944), and “Iolo Morganwg, Bard of Liberty” (1945).

Dr Price's name is generally recalled in the context of the history of cremation, but it was his involvement in the Chartist movement that first established him as a notable personality. The first modern account of that movement in Wales was David Williams' “John Frost, a study in Chartism”, written at the request of the Newport Chartist Centenary Committee and published in 1939.

David Williams referred to Dr. Price's account of events, and used references to his activities by others, yet although he deployed his customary caution in assessing Price's actions he was clearly not comfortable with “this unaccountable person”. So it was T. Islwyn Nicholas (1903 – 1980), known as Islwyn ap Niclas, who, in the same year, first gave a rounded and sympathetic account of this influential and extraordinary character.

Islwyn's personal background perhaps helped him come to terms with Dr. William Price, just as Ivor Wilks' experiences gave him a distinctive 'take' on the Chartist rising at Newport. He was the son of a famous father, Thomas Evan Nicholas (1880 – 1971) who was better known by his bardic name Niclas y Glais, taking the name of Glais in the Swansea valley where he became a preacher. Niclas joined the Independent Labour Party (I.L.P) in 1905, worked with Keir Hardie, preached at Hardie's funeral at Aberdare in 1915 and stood for Labour at Aberdare in the 1918 election.

In 1921, Niclas and his son Islwyn set up a dental practice in Aberystwyth. Niclas organised Carmarthenshire farmworkers into a union, set up the Labour Party in the county, joined the Communist Party on its foundation in 1920, and was expelled from the Labour Party in 1926. He became a very popular preacher and speaker, and a prolific poet.

In July 1940, he and Islwyn were arrested on preposterous charges of fascism and imprisoned, first in Swansea and then Brixton. After widespread protests on their behalf, they were released four months later. Niclas continued to write and to be politically active, and in his later years was involved in CND. An obituary referred to him respectfully but mischievously as “Christian and Communist, poet and preacher, prophet and dentist”. It was said that many people in Aberystwyth had their political and cultural horizons widened by a visit to the dentist.

While Niclas wrote poetry mainly in Welsh, his son Islwyn wrote prose in English. As well as his four important Welsh history publications, Islwyn also wrote about the poet and preacher R.J. Derfel whose work had been admired by his father, and compiled “Thus Spake Prophets: An Anthology of Ancient Social Protest”(1948). His papers in the National Library of Wales include an unpublished work “Poet behind Bars” about the imprisonment of his father and himself, and another about David Ivon Jones, a Unitarian from Aberystwyth who became an important figure in the early history of the South African Communist Party and labour movement. Islwyn's correspondence includes letters from Hugh MacDiarmid and Sean O'Casey.

His last published work was “Heretics at Large, the story of a Unitarian Chapel”- the Meeting House at Aberystwyth. He was a Unitarian lay preacher for over 35 years and the foreword to this small book sums up his own philosophy in the words of Ralph Emerson -

“The new church will be founded on moral science.

Poets, artists, musicians and philosophers will be

its prophet-teachers. The noblest literature of the

world will be its Bible – love and labour its sacra-

ments – and instead of worshipping one saviour,

we will gladly build an altar in the heart for every-

one who has suffered for humanity.”

This is the man who set out to rescue the reputation of Dr William Price, who until then had either been forgotten or dismissed as an eccentric. Why did he choose to write about Dr. Price before tackling the story of Dic Penderyn or Iolo Morganwg? Could it be that, unlike David Williams, Islwyn did not find Price “unaccountable” at all. Rather, he found him both easy to identify with and a challenge to explain. Dic Penderyn was a product of the new working class movement created by the industrial revolution, while Iolo was very much a pre-industrial artisan whose mental framework straddled radical democracy and cultural nationalism. William Price was at the meeting point of these two worlds, just as Islwyn and his father were.

All of Islwyn's books were published in the same small paperback format as the Left Book Club editions of the 1930s, with which he and his father were familiar. “A Welsh Heretic” is only 48 pages long; not one of the others is more than 120 pages – just long enough for the reader to get the essentials of the subject without getting bogged down in detail.

“A Welsh Heretic” is not an academic work so there are no footnotes, and readers may wonder what were Islwyn's sources for such fascinating material? The answer is threefold. To a surprisingly large extent he was able to rely on the words of William Price himself, mainly in a series of remarkable interviews published in the South Wales Daily News in 1888. So Islwyn's account of Price's early life, his medical training, his involvement in Chartism, his controversial views on the medical profession and on what we now call 'alternative medicine', on marriage and on cremation, and the accounts of the extraordinary court appearances which punctuated the last forty years of his life all rely heavily on the words of Price himself. These accounts are sometimes a little embroidered but are in substance accurate.

Where necessary Islwyn provides context by material drawn from general histories of the time and from local newspapers – particularly in relation to the cremation of Price's son Iesu Grist (Jesus Christ), the following trial which established the legality of cremation in this country, and the death and cremation of Price himself. On other matters, especially Price's reputation as a doctor, Islwyn draws on oral tradition, which occasionally contains some understandable exaggeration, but is generally reliable and has resulted in only two factual errors.

Firstly, local tradition within Pontypridd mistakenly maintains that the two Round Houses which Price built at Glyntaff, still visible from the A470, were intended as gatehouses for a mansion behind. However the hillside at this point is too steep for this to have been practical, and this seems to have become confused with an earlier project to build a tower near the Rocking Stone on Coedpenmaen Common, only a quarter of a mile away, which Price abandoned when he became involved in the Chartist movement, and which Islwyn did not know about.

Secondly, the tradition that Price spent seven years in Paris after the defeat of the Chartist rising at Newport is also mistaken. Government spies' accounts in the Home Office papers prove that he was back within a few months, and quickly resumed his political activities. However it would clearly be unfair to blame Islwyn ap Niclas for not having access to these papers in 1939.

So this little book rehabilitated Dr. William Price as someone worth serious attention, both by those interested in the history of Chartism and in the wider social and cultural history of Wales in the nineteenth century. However Islwyn did not write a hagiography. He was well aware of the complexities of his subject, prefacing his work by writing that -

“It was as though a composite creature had stepped out of the pages of Old Testament History and, in his passage through the centuries, had enriched his personality from the flow of all the hidden streams of Myth and Legend”.

- but Islwyn left further exploration of the cultural dimension of Price's activities and beliefs to others.

Much has been written about Dr. William Price since the pioneering work of Islwyn ap Niclas and no doubt more will be written, but this book is the place to start reading.

More about Dr Price can be found in the downloadable PDF in our Archives Section "A Welsh Heretic" by Islwyn ap Nicholas