The True Origin of the 'China' nickname for Merthyr's Prostitute District.

China in Merthyr Tydfil was the most notorious area of prostitution and criminality in Victorian Wales.
The problem is no-one knows why it was nicknamed 'China'. As this blog is about my love of dodgy districts in Victorian Wales I'm very pleased to have finally solved this mystery.

Pontystorehouse in yellow, China in red.

Most recently Joe England's excellent new book 'Merthyr: The Crucible of Modern Wales', says:

'Where the name China came from is unknown but it probably came from an imaginative journalist who saw the district as mysterious and dangerous. From the early 1840's Britain was involved in 'Opium Wars' with China.' 

Keith Strange says as the Victorians became aware of the real country's 'strange culture and customs' they named another 'alien' society, namely Merthyr's underworld, after the same thing.

All the historians who have written about China, better scholars than I, have no idea how the name started.

I can reveal, I believe for the first time in over 180 years, that China in Merthyr was not named due a vague imagined link to a 'mysterious' and 'strange' culture but something more local and specific.

It was named after the exploits of a 55 year old God-fearing tee-totalling zealous missionary Wesleyan called Walter Watkins, commonly known as 'Father Watkins.'

Here's how I know:

'China' was, pre-1843, known as 'The Cellars', 'The Cellary', or Pontystorehouse. This was it's official name until the 1890's and it appears on the census as 'The Cellars'.

This area was already notorious as a sex-work and brothel area since the 1820's and it was where prostitutes and their bullies (pimps) congregated. Thus in January 1841 reports like this appeared in the newspapers:

Pontystorehouse was technically on the other side of the river to The Cellars but they were both old areas dating from the 1790's when the Glamorganshire canal terminated nearby. Warehouses and houses sprung up around this canal head giving it the name Pontystorehouse which translates as 'Bridge of the Warehouse'. (It's worth noting here that the opposite end of the Glamorganshire Canal in Cardiff was where Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane were located.)

On the 11th June 1842 this report appeared in the newspaper, relating the case of Mary Davies, alias 'Mary Strap':

It exhorted the religious community to cleanse the 'vast storehouse of evil' in Pontystorehouse (nice play on words!)

Now the Wesleyans were already holding Tea Parties in Merthyr Tydfil, as this report from January 1843 shows:

And lo and behold less than a year later in April 1843 we read that they had turned their attentions to the Cellars:

Cleaning the Augean Stables was one of the 12 tasks of Hercules as the stables were so massively full of cow shit. Again they are referring to how society saw the Cellars.

So at the start of April 1843 the Wesleyans set about 'cleaning' the Pontstorehouse Cellars  by holding religious meetings there. They're not named in this article- but, as you will soon see, I'm pretty sure I know who their leader was.

A month later the newspaper was congratulating them on their success, they had rescued one of the 'nymphs' (prostitutes) from the Cellars. Well, they had encouraged her to go back home anyway.

Five months after this and for the first time ever The Cellars and Pontstorehouse are referred to as 'China' in an important article on the bully Benjamin Richards alias 'Benny Blackstone' and some of his cronies, including Edward 'Ned' Hudson:

This article goes all out calling Blackstone 'Emperor of China' but then using the old term 'Pontstorehouse Cellars' to clarify where it was talking about. Something must have happened before October 1843 that influenced the name change to China.

We have to then wait until February 1845 to hear the name China again in a report about Edward 'Ned' Hudson running a foot race and this is where it all nicely clicks into place:

The reporter here obviously knows his stuff. So what happened? A Father Watkins- who happened to be a massive advocate of temperance (i.e. not drinking) went into the Cellars and preached to the prostitutes and bullies every Sunday morning. Now it just happens that Father Watkins also ran the Canton Tea Shop on High Street in Merthyr, and presumably part of this efforts involved exhorting the prostitutes and bullies to drink Chinese tea instead- and this at a time when tea was a big novelty and not the widely used drink it is today.

Hence the preacher who ran the Canton Tea Shop was the cause of the name 'Little China', or more correctly 'China Fach' - the majority of The Cellars being Welsh speaking at this time. After 1845 the name China is used frequently, as is 'The Celestial City' and references to the Emperor and Empress of China.

I'm pretty confident that Father Watkins was the main man among the Wesleyans who went to China to preach in April 1843- though the 1845 article does not give dates it is written less than two years after the 'preaching' event.

If you doubt this explanation here is some more information on Father Watkins and his zeal for  temperance movements, the bible generally and mission work:

Firstly the dates all match up. In July 1843 at a meeting of the British and Foreign Bible Society in Merthyr Father Watkins 'declared that his love to the bible society reached to his head and his pocket, and he laid on the table the sum of five guineas as his subscription.' (a large amount of cash at the time!)

In August 1843- four months after 'The Wesleyans' were in the Cellars preaching and two months before the first known use of the name 'China' his Canton Tea Rooms were obviously established as they were advertised in the newspaper:

The article explaining Father Watkins' reason for going into the Cellars mentions drunkenness and Father Watkins hated alcohol with a vengeance. In December 1843 Father Watkins was elected the chair of the Merthyr Teetotallers where at a meeting of a thousand people he 'in his usual style (which meant he'd been doing this before) fired at once against the demon intemperance':

So was Father Watkins a Wesleyan? Well in December 1845 at the death of a well known Wesleyan minster Walter Watkins testified that he had known him for forty years. In 1851 Walter presented a watch at a Wesleyan friends party and, by the by, that report gives the names of Walter Watkins and then Father Watkins in the same report- so it's definitely the same man. 

Father Watkins kept up his anti drink crusade all of his life. In April 1846 Mr Walter Watkins presided at the Merthyr Temperance meeting and was described as 'that veteran teetotaller'.

In August 1848 he chaired lectures by a famous teetotaller and was described as 'that staunch teetotaller.'

He even tried to convert the great ironmaster Sir John Josiah Guest:

1849 he was again supporting the British and Foreign Bible Society, he was part of the Early Closing Association (i.e. the closing of pubs!) and he was taking contributions for the Temperance Conference for Wales at Swansea.

You get the idea, this guy was hardcore anti-drink and pro-missionary work- exactly what he was doing at The Cellars.

He sold his grocery business in 1850 but kept the Canton Tea Warehouse and continued his involvement in all of his religious and temperance societies, for example at a meeting of the London Missionary Society he 'opened the proceedings in a speech replete with a zeal for missions.' 

Father Watkins died aged 66 on the 22nd December 1854.

So - I can confirm here once and for all that the worst area for prostitution and vice in Wales is named after Father Watkins- a sincere man with a 'hatred of drunkenness' whose speeches were full of 'fiery and riotous declamation'.

Father Watkins obviously liked tea very much, it was his occupation and his drink of choice, so his association with temperance and The Canton Tea Rooms gave The Cellars the nickname 'China Fach' after the Spring of 1843 when he brought his fiery missionary zeal to the prostitutes and bullies. The community obviously remembered him well.
This report about 'Lovely Mary Ann' in 1846 shows the 'China Fach' name beginning to embed in the consciousness of the locals:

I'm sure the connotations with China as a mysterious and 'otherly' land helped the name to stick but let's all raise a teacup to remember Father Watkins. I'm really pleased I have uncovered his story and put a mystery to rest. 

References:

Merthyr: The Crucible of Modern Wales, Parthain, 2017.
Keith Strange 'In Search of the Celestial Empire Llafur Vol3 No1 1980
THE 'CONQUERING OF CHINA': CRIME IN AN INDUSTRIAL COMMUNITY, 1842-64 David Jones and Alan Bainbridge in Llafur Vol2 No 4 1979.
Age is from death in 1854, the Census 1851 Merthyr Tydfil HO107/2458 f.553 p.12 puts him younger.
William Row report: Glamorgan Monmouth and Brecon Gazette and Merthyr Guardian January 1841, I have unfortunately not recorded the exact date...
Mary Davies: Monmouthshire Merlin 11 June 1842 p.3.
1841 sentencing The Cambrian 10 July 1841 p.4. and for release from custody HO13 Home Office: Correspondence and Warrants Piece 78 p.238
Augean Stables: CMBGMG 29 April 1853 p.2.
Benjamin Richards: CMBGMG 21 October 1843 p.3.
Explanation report MM 22 February 1845 p.3.
History of Tea
Bible Society report The Cambrian 15 July 1843 p.2.
Canton Tea advert GMBGMG 12 August 1843 p.2.
Merthyr Teetotallers MM 30 December 1843 p.3.
Death of Rev John Davies The Cambrian 26 December 1845 p.3. Watch presentation CMGGMBG 29 March 1851 p.3.
Veteran Teetollar MM 18 April 1846 p.3.
Staunch Teetotaller CMGGMBG 26 August 1848 p.3.
Guest: Merthyr Telegraph 26 January 1856 p.2.
Bible Meeting The Principality 30 March 1849 p.8. Early Closing Association The Principality 29 June 1849 p.5. Temperance Conference The Principality 20 July 1849 p.1. Warm manner CMGGMBG 31 July 1852 p.3.
Selling Canton Tea Warehouse The Principality 21 June 1850 p.4. Missions The Welshman 17 October 1851 p.3.
Death in The Welshman 1 December 1854 p.3. Obituary CMGGMBG 1 December 1854 p.3.
Mary Ann Morgans The Welshman 3 July 1846 p.3.

The Twelve Day Death of Eliza Lewis

This one is perhaps one of the darkest stories I have come across in my research and it involved two Charlotte Street women.

First we have to go back to 1863 when a house was found ablaze in the morning:

The arsonist was found to be a girl called Elizabeth Tregall and she was brought before the court on the Saturday:

Elizabeth would spend the next two nights in a cell at the police station on St Mary Street. She was back in court on the Monday:

So they let her off an arson charge but she got three months hard labour for vagrancy, probably in  Cardiff Gaol. 

However the original Police Court records of this case paint a different picture. Elizabeth Tregall only looked 15 years old because she was emaciated and malnourished. She was actually in her early twenties. PC Surcombe states:

"She has no employment, she said her husband was at sea" 

Also Sergeant Glass states:

"I have known prisoner 5 or 6 months. She is married but her husband has left her and she has been on the town . She has no home and nowhere to sleep. I see her wonder round the streets every night."(This description means she was homeless rather than working as a prostitute)

While in Cardiff Gaol Eliza would have met Adeliade Paine, Annie Yarwood and Mary Murphy, all experienced brothel keepers from Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane who were also there at this time. Also there was Sue Walker, in for smashing the windows of her old brothel on Charlotte Street and Catherine Mitchell, a prostitute in for stopping men and using foul language.  

So if Elizabeth wasn't familiar with prostitution in Cardiff before gaol she certainly would have known all about it by the time she left. 

Cut to a year later and an Elizabeth Lewis (bear with me on the name) is up for soliciting on Bute Street:

"Three sailors were coming up. Prisoner caught hold of one between the legs and behaved in a very disorderly way."

Then next year our Elizabeth resurfaces as Eliza on Charlotte Street in April 1865:

It reads:

"At 12:30 on Sat night saw prisoner drunk in Charlotte St. She was hollering and shouting- she is a prostitute. 7 days Hard Labour"

So Eliza was back in gaol. She was picked up again the next month:

"Last night at one o'clock saw defendant in Nelson Street drunk and behaving in a very riotous manner using obscene language. She is a prostitute. Cautioned."

Things then came to a dramatic conclusion in February 1866 and is evidence of the name change:

The other newspaper report gives more information but not the alias:

See my other blog post on the Glamorganshire Canal for more background on how common this was. This lock on the junction canal still exists today.

The body they had pulled from the canal was badly decomposed and so Elizabeth Lewis/Tregall was pronounced dead at the inquest and a death certificate was issued for her. She was hurriedly buried at Cathays Cemetary. 

The thing is the body wasn't Eliza. For twelve days Eliza Lewis was walking dead and buried on the streets of Cardiff.

Ten days later the lock gates on the junction canal were not shutting properly. The workman overseeing the lock used his grappling hooks to remove the blockage. He pulled up the mutilated corpse of a baby girl. The sixth month old was wearing clothes from Cardiff Workhouse:

This led to enquiries being made at the workhouse and soon enough the mistake was realised.

The woman's body wasn't Eliza but Mary Wheelan who had taken her daughter Catherine out of the workhouse on Sunday to go to chapel. Mary had possibly slit her baby's throat before she hugged her daughter and jumped into the canal. I think the doctor is sparing the dead mother here in his sudden change of mind about the cut- is it not doubtful that two huge lock gates could make a clean cut from ear to ear of a six month old baby?

Mary Wheelan herself had probably worked as a prostitute on Charlotte Street as she was assaulted there by a bully in June 1865, two months before she gave birth to Catherine in the workhouse. 

Of course it is possible she fell in by accident, the Junction Canal ran under Bute Street, but it seems probable this was a suicide.

Why she committed suicide and murdered her child we will never know but post-natal depression, desperation and despair must have lain at the root of the cause.

Interestingly it seems that the deaths of Mary and Catherine were not registered officially, even though Eliza's incorrect death was. The Burial Register at Cathays was also not altered so the grave is still named as Elizabeth Lewis, there is no indication her daughters body was buried with her. Surely this is the result of some highly insensitive bureaucratic oversight after the inquest. 

As for Eliza Lewis being dead did not stop her:

That is from the July after she was recorded as dead in February.

In November of the same year Eliza was stripping clothes lines along Bute Street:

Eliza was sentenced to a year in gaol for this offence. 

There the trail goes cold for Eliza. I can't be sure when she died or if she remarried as the name Elizabeth Lewis is so common, she certainly did not carry on as Elizabeth Tregall. 

References
Fire: Cardiff and Merthyr Guardian 29th May 1863 p.8.
Saturday Court and Monday court are the same reference.
Police Court is Glamorgan Record Office PSCBO/1/39 Elizabeth Tregall 23rd May 1863. The other women in Cardiff gaol are also from this record in May and June 1863. I can find no record of any Tregall living in Cardiff in this time, or any marriage between a Tregall and an Elizabeth either, though it is highly likely they are from Cornwall.
Catching hold of sailors is PSCBO/1/42 Elizabeth Lewis 4th June 1864
Prostitution charges PSCBO/1/44 Eliza Lewis 24th April and 17th May 1865.
Inquest on Eliza Lewis MM 10 February 1866 p.8. and Cardiff Times 9 February 1866 p.5. Death Certificate is March quarter 1866 Cardiff 11a 164. Cathays Cemetary plot K929.
Mary Wheelan inquest Cardiff Times 23 February 1866 p.5. Her daughter is Catherine Wheelan see birth Cardiff Sept Quart 11a 259.
Mary Wheelan on Charlotte Street is Cardiff Times 9 June 1865 p.7. and PSCBO/1/45 Thomas Davies 7th June 1865. Strangely Thomas Davies alias Clark was sentenced to a year imprisonment at the New Year Assizes in 1866 for theft of meat from Bute Street- he could be the bully that Eliza Tregall was supposedly bereaving when it was thought she had committed suicide.
Eliza tea can theft: CT 20 July 1866 p.8.
Eliza clothes theft: CT 2 November 1866 p.6. and trial CT 12 January 1867 p.8

Cross Dressing in Victorian Cardiff: Usurping the Masculine Prerogative

I love this. I can picture Ann Williams, pissed after an all night bender on Whitmore Lane, being stopped by the bemused copper at 9 o'clock Sunday morning as she strides towards him dressed as a sailor. Her reply to his question of 'why?' is also class, she wants what any sailor on shore wants, more booze.

This blog post looks at one of the subversive ways in which the 'working girls' of Victorian Cardiff had fun. It's another offshoot subject from my book on two very notorious Cardiff streets, the introduction to which can be found here. 

Looking at the end of this newspaper article, from February 1855, it's quite sad that a bunch of rich, entitled, middle-aged men would consider a 'good-looking girl of light fame' dressing up as a sailor as a threat to their 'masculine prerogative'. 

Ann Williams was obviously just having fun but she got two weeks in gaol for it. Ann, 28 years old when this happened, had probably been drinking throughout the night at the brothel she ran with her 'husband' Ned Llewellyn. They'd been together for at least 8 years and I bet she'd borrowed some clothes from a customer at the brothel. 

Ann's antics were unusual but not unique. 

In May of 1855 Sarah Ann Hopkins was dressed as a sailor on Bute Street at 11 o'clock at night:

She had a large number of people around her, was identified as a prostitute and was charged for obstructing the footway, which was a convenient charge often levelled at prostitutes who were hanging about on the street. Neither the newspaper or court record gives any explanation as to why, it was probably just for fun. 

On Bonfire Night in 1856 Caroline Williams appeared in court dressed in men's clothes after being apprehended the night before on the dock road. 

She didn't fancy staying at the Workhouse and was out within a few weeks and back working. She was working in Mary the Cripple's brothel two years later and by 1861 she'd been arrested 20 times. By 1863 this had increased to 35 arrests. Caroline had a daughter in the workhouse in 1869 but the poor thing only lasted a few weeks of life. 

In December of the same year 17 year old Ann Amos was picked up in the evening dressed as a sailor:

Here the newspaper interprets her dressing as a sailor to avoid being arrested for soliciting, implying that many others had. Perhaps this was the case, I suppose the women could walk away when they saw a copper and surprise the sailor up close. Ann may have been sent to Newport but she came back to Cardiff and was living in a brothel on Peel Street by 1861. 

On the 24th May 1858 19 year old Whitmore Lane girl Elizabeth Ford (the newspaper name is wrong) was found on the Canton Road at night in men's clothes too. 

Because she was a prostitute, or 'femme galante', the magistrates thought she was up to no good. She was arrested for 'intention of committing a felony' and got her seven days prison for 'Indecent Behaviour'.

When she says she did it for fun I believe her. Elizabeth had been a prostitute on Whitmore Lane since she was 17, having been turned out by her father and wicked step-mother aged 16. By 1860 fun loving Liz Ford had lost an eye, probably in an assault by a customer or a bully, and she was still a working girl three years later in 1863. She is probably the same Elizabeth Ford 'a woman of bad character' who was arrested for being drunk and improper in 1872 when she would have been 32.
In 1860 Ellen Hall was standing at the doorway of the brothel at 25 Whitmore Lane making a great noise and dressed in men's clothes. No reason is given in the court records.

Ellen Thomas went one better in December 1861 when she stole a soldiers clothes, presumably while he was asleep in a brothel, and went on the parade on Bute Street early in the morning:

Men had the same issue too it seems. When an Italian sailor was found on Bute Street in 1853 wearing 'a blue cotton frock, red plaid shawl, a victorina and velvet bonnet with flowers in it' he was told that might be okay in Italy but 'in this country people were not allowed to play off such pranks.' He was dealt with lightly as he was a foreigner and fined ten shillings. 

I know that some women dressed as men to pass themselves off for work, such as Susan Brunin of Newport who was arrested in Cardiff for being drunk in August 1853. She was arrested while walking with a girl and found to be a woman dressed as a sailor. She'd come off the ship Eliza and had signed articles (a contract) to go on her next voyage too. I've found no evidence of other women, or men, continually cross dressing as a lifestyle from 1840-1860. 

The girls from Whitmore Lane and Charlotte Street, being social outsiders, were probably well aware of the subversive, trouble making nature of the act and the law enforcers punished them for it. Also, as in the words of the great Cyndi Lauper, they probably just wanted to have fun (but of course they got punished for that too).

References:

The PSCBO/1/ references are the Petty Sessional Records (otherwise known as the Police Courts) held at Glamorgan Record Office.

Ann Williams: Cardiff and Merthyr Guardian 1855 February 9th p.4.

Sarah Hopkins: CMG 1855 May 19th p.3. Possibly living on Whitmore Lane see CMG 1852 December 18th p.4. There is a Sarah Hopkins running a brothel at 5 Whitmore Lane on the 1851 census but she would be 40 years old at the time of wearing the sailors clothes, I think the newspaper would have commented on this. 

Caroline Williams: Male dress see Monmouthshire Merlin 1856 November 8th p.5. Out and working CMG 1856 November 29th p.8. Drunk and disorderly CMG 1856 December 6th p.8. Working at the Farmer's Arms CMG August 28th p.6. Veteran Offender Cardiff Mercury 1861 July 6th p.3. 35 convictions CMG 1863 December 4th p.7. Daughter baptised July 4th Cardiff St John n.3. Death Sept quarter Cardiff 11a 133. The report 'Frail Daughter of Eve' gives an insight into her life when she appeared 'without her head covered' with a load of sailors, she swore at the arresting policeman then hit him over the head in the police station as he read the charge CMG 1859 May 21st p.6.

Ann Amos CMG 1856 December 13th p.8. also PSCBO/1/18 Ann Amos 10th December. There's not many references to Ann Amos but there is one PSCBO/1/23 Ann Amos 25th May 1859 and brothel at 40 Peel Street 1861 census Cardiff St Mary RG9/4036 F.20 p.32. 

Elizabeth Ford: Newspaper see CMG 1858 May 29th p.8. For her proper name and the time of day see  PSCBO/1/20 Elizabeth Ford 25th May 1858 and also PSCBO/1/21 Elizabeth Ford 26th May 1858. For Whitmore Lane brothel theft in same year see MM 1858 September 11th p.3. where she got gaoled for nine months at the assizes see MM 1858 December 11th p.8. For early life see CMG 1856 February 16th p.8. Also see Cardiff Times 1859 September 17th p.4. MM 1856 May 24th p.5. For lost eye see MM 1860 March 24th p.8. For last brothel reference CT 1864 October 28th p.8. and last reference CMG 1872 February 17th p.6.  For baptism at St John and St Mary's Cardiff on October 29th 1839 no.1185.
Ellen Hall CMG 18 August 1860 p.6. and little more info at PSCBO/1/29 Ellen Hall 14th August 1860.
Ellen Thomas CT 6 December 1861 p.7. and PSCBO/1/35 2nd December

Susan Brunin MM 1855 August 18th p.4. CMG 1855 August 18th p.6. She is Sarah Bruton in the court records PSCBO/1/16 Sarah Bruton 16th August 1855. 

David Walgoria CMG 1853 November 26th p.4.

All images are courtesy of the wonderful Welsh Newspapers Online site which can be found here.