| Nicholas Minns is looking into the life and times of his
great grandfather Charles Island. Nicholas raised a number of questions about Swansea in
the 1880s and we thought that a number of people would be interested in the answers: Swansea's population of seamen dramatically increased with the opening
of the South dock in 1859. Not only did the opening of the new dock double the size of the
port's accommodation but it fundamentally changed the nature of the type of ships that
were able to enter Swansea. Consequently, Swansea had to deal with large numbers of
merchant seamen needing temporary or semi-permanent lodgings. Being the focus of the
original port, The Strand quickly developed into a mass of hotels, rooming houses and
bars, and gaining a rather dark reputation as the underworld of Victorian Swansea.
Merchant seamen from all over northern Europe found regular
employment in the Swansea coal trade and many settled in the growing suburb of Port
Tennant on the east side of the River Tawe. Thus by the 1880s Swansea had two 'maritime',
districts, The Strand (warning large graphic file!)
and Port Tennant. Large numbers of Swansea people trace their origins from the seafarers
that settled here at this time, and it is probably true that Swansea's distinct identity
and character owes more to its maritime past than its Welsh location.
As with many American settlers, it is evident that seamen from
many cultures and languages changed or altered their foreign names to make it easier to
spell, pronounce or fit in with local people. Charles Island sounds like a typical Swansea
mariner in both his origins and where he lived in town. Changing a name was a simple
procedure (much easier than nowadays), there would have been little need for official
documentation for the nineteenth century was still a predominantly illiterate society for
working people and names would have been frequently misspelt in all sorts of papers and
documentation.
By the 1880s, Swansea was one of a number of flourishing ports
on the South Wales coast. It was a simple matter to travel to Cardiff, Newport or Barry to
pick up a ship and there was considerable travel on the Great Western Railway line around
the coast.
Below: The port of Swansea shortly after the Prince of
Wales Dock (on the left in the picture) was opened in 1881. |