Mabel Elsie Davies

Place of birth: Fforestfach

Service: Canteen worker, NEF Pembrey

Notes: Mabel was the eldest daughter of Eliza [qv] and Huw Davies. Fourteen when her father died, she started munitions work at Pembrey. When her age was discovered, she was transferred to work in the canteen.

Sources: People’s Collection Wales

Reference: WaW0322

Mabel Elsie Davies

Studio photograph of Mabel Davies. Owner Mrs Dorothy Jones.

Kate Owen

Place of birth: Aberystwyth

Service: Cook, then tailoress, WAAC/QMAAC, 1917 - 1918

Notes: Kate Owen joined the WAAC in Autumn 1917, aged 45. She was a trained seamstress, and was rapidly moved into the Tailoring department. She served at several of the main camps, including Halton Camp Buckinghamshire and Kinmel Camp, north Wales (twice). She was discharged in September 1918.

Sources: National Archives WO-398-170-4

Reference: WaW0319

Service record

Service record for Kate Owen, showing her various postings.

Eliza Davies (née Belton)

Place of birth: Norfolk

Service: Supervisor, munitions, NEF Pembrey

Notes: Originally from Norforlk, Eliza was in service in Builth when she met her husband Huw Davies and they moved to Fforest Fach. Huw died in 1916 and Eliza began work at Pembrey, being promoted to supervisor. In 1920 she was awarded the MoBE ‘for courage and presence of mind in removing a burning fuze from a box of components, thus obviating what might have been a very serious explosion’. Her eldest daughter Mabel Elsie [qv] also worked at Pembrey.

Sources: Peoples Collection Wales

Reference: WaW0321

Eliza Davies and family

Eliza Davies and her family, probably taken in 1916 while they were still in mourning for Huw. Mrs Dorothy Jones 2018.

London Gazette

Notice of Eliza Davies’s award of the MoBE, London Gazette 7th July 1920.

Letter

Letting inviting Eliza Davies to her award of the MoBE, 23rd September 1920. Mrs Dorothy Jones 2018.

Phyllis May Hughes, Lady (née Edisbury )

Place of birth: Denbighshire ?

Service: Commandant, committee woman, Munitions, 1914 - 1918

Notes: Lady Hughes was from a North Wales family, and married to Sir Thomas Hughes, a Cardiff-based politician. During the War she was a committee member of the Women’s Emergency Corps, the Soldiers, Sailors and Families Association, the District Nursing Association and other bodies. She was also Commandant of the Grangetown, Cardiff, Munitions Canteen, for which she was awarded an OBE in 1918.

Reference: WaW0330

Newspaper report

Report of Phyllis Hughes’s achievement at the end of a report of her husband’s knighthood. Glamorgan Gazette 7th January 1916

Citation

Citation for award of OBE to Lady Hughes. The London Gazette, 7 June, 1918.

Helen Olive Rees

Place of birth: Cardiff

Service: Nurse, VAD, 1917 - 1919

Notes: Olive seems to have joined the VAD in December 1917. She spent most of her service in naval hospitals, in Chelsea and Chatham. Her name appears in the printed Roll of Honour of Charles Street Congregational Church, Cardiff.rnrn

Reference: WaW0329

Roll of Honour

Name of Olive Rees on the Roll of Honour of Charles Street Congregational Church, Cardiff.

Red Cross record card

Red cross card for Olive Rees VAD.

Red Cross record card

Reverse of second Red Cross card for Olive Rees, showing service at RNH Chatham.

Olive David

Place of birth: Cardiff

Service: Nurse, VAD, 15/06/12 – 16/01/14

Notes: Olive David spent most of her service at the 26th General Hospital, Etaples, France. Her name appears in the printed Roll of Honour of Charles Street Congregational Church, Cardiff.

Reference: WaW0328

Olive David

Olive David in VAD uniform.

Red Cross record card

Red Cross card for Olive David of Llandaff, Cardiff.

Red Cross record card (reverse)

Red Cross card for Olive David of Llandaff, Cardiff (reverse).

Roll of Honour

Name of Olive David on the Roll of Honour of Charles Street Congregational Church, Cardiff.

not known / anhysbys Knott

Place of birth: Pontypridd

Service: Nurse, not known / anhysbys

Notes: Nothing is currently known of Nurse Knott, whose name appears on the Roll of Honour of St Matthews Church, Trallwn, Pontypridd.

Reference: WaW0140

Roll of Honour

Name of Nurse Knott on the Roll of Honour of St Matthews Church, Trallwn, Pontypridd. Courtesy Dr Gethin Matthews.

Maud Jepson

Place of birth: Aberystwyth

Service: Clerk, WAAC, June / Mehefin 1917

Notes: Maud Jepson was ‘the first volunteer from Aberystwyth’ to join the group of WAAC clerks assembled by Lady Mackworth to work in France.

Reference: WaW0326

Newspaper report and photograph

Maud Jepson’ photograph and interview. Cambrian News 22nd June 1917.

Newspaper report (2)

Maud Jepson’s interview (2). Cambrian News 22nd June 1917.

Florence Wheeler

Service: Pub licencee

Notes: Florence Wheeler applied to the Llanelly Police Court for the right to hold a licence for the Swan Inn, Llanelly. There was some doubt that a women could hold a licence, but she was successful. She had already managed the Greyhound, ‘the largest house in the town’.

Reference: WaW0327

Newspaper report

Report of Florence Wheeler’s successful application for a licence for the Swan public house, Llanelly.

Marie De Saedeleer

Place of birth: Sint-Martens-Latem, Belgium

Service: Weaver

Notes: Marie was the eldest of five daughters of the Belgian artist Valerius de Saedeleer. He was among a group of artists encouraged by Gwendoline and Margaret Davies [qv] to come to Wales as refugees in 1914. The family settled in Aberystwyth, with strong ties to University College, Aberystwyth. Marie, like her sister Elisabeth, [qv] became interested in weaving. They both taught in the newly formed Arts and Crafts department of the college, together with their father. On her return to Belgium in 1921 Marie worked with her sister Elisabeth at the Arts Centre they set up in Etikhove, Belgium.

Reference: WaW0332

Marie de Saedeleer and her sisters

Marie is one of the two girls standing at the front by their loom. Elisabeth is at the back.

Newspaper report

Report of a concert in aid of Dr Barnardo’s. Cambrian News 23rd August 1918.