Wales is blessed with many fascinating towns and villages, the names of which are often as interesting as the history of the communities themselves. Quaker's Yard, a few miles to the south of Merthyr Tydfil, is one of these.
The tiny village sits close to Treharris in the Merthyr Vale, more or less on the spot where the Taff and the smaller Taff Bargoed rivers meet. These days Quaker's Yard falls under the remit and control of the Merthyr Tydfil County Borough but the village has a long, interesting and totally independent history.
The original Welsh name for the place was Rhyd y Grug, the Ford of the Rustling Waters. This was obviously an apt description for the area as the shallow and protected ford was an easy crossing place from one side of the Taff to the other.
The ford was eventually replaced by a small stone bridge but, for many years, the original name stuck.
The name Quaker's Yard is, obviously, linked to the Quaker religion. By the middle years of the 17th century there was widespread dissatisfaction – in England as well as in Wales - with the established Church of England. Inevitably, many dissenting groups soon broke away from the church to form their own sects or divisions.
Persecution and punishment of these 'Dissenters', groups such as the Baptists and Quakers – the Society of Friends, to give them their correct name - was common. Nevertheless, faith and commitment drove them onwards in the face of what were sometimes overwhelming odds.
The origins of Quaker's Yard as a village and independent community is part and parcel of this persecution. Quakers believed, and still believe, that people could have direct experience of God without the third-party intervention of the clergy. It is, therefore, easy to see why such a stance created unrest in the ranks of ministers and even the state itself.
By 1650 Baptists, Quakers and other independent religious groups in the Merthyr area were worshipping at a farm at Pentwyn. It was remote and well out of the view of the authorities and for a while the various Dissenting groups, despite their individual beliefs or creeds, continued to worship together.
However, in 1667 the Quakers were given the use of a small piece of land on an estate owned by Mary Chapman. In her will of 1700 this land was subsequently given to the society and on this pature land the Quakers decided to create a burial ground. The community of Quaker's Yard began to take shape.
Quaker's Yard was, until the second half of the 19th century, a quiet rural spot. There was a corn mill and a small woollen mill and a small scattering of houses. With its ancient bridge across the Taff the village could even boast two inns, ideal watering holes for weary travellers on their way to and from Cardiff.
The Industrial Revolution, of course, changed all that. Soon the coal trade totally revolutionized the nature of the environment, creating booming and burgeoning communities like Treharris and Trelewis, both of them just a stones throw away from Quaker's Yard.
The link to Quakerism remained strong. Treharris was named after William Harris, a Quaker businessman whose family owned a fleet of steam ships, while streets in the new towns were named after famous Quakers such as William Penn and George Fox.
In 1858 the Quaker's Yard High Level station was opened. Together with the village's Low Level station this created a lively and bustling railway junction where passengers could embark for places like Merthyr and Aberdare and coal could be dispatched down the valley to the docks at Cardiff.
In 1840 the engineer – and guiding force behind the Great Western Railway - Isambard Kingdom Brunel began work on a six-arched viaduct across the River Taff. While the High Level station closed in 1964, the viaduct is still there, carrying traffic from Merthyr to Cardiff.
Perhaps the most famous man to emerge from Quaker's Yard was the world flyweight boxing champion Jimmy Wilde who was born in the village in 1892. Known as 'the ghost with a hammer in his hand', Wilde fought an amazing 864 bouts, losing only four of them, and reigned as champion between 1916 and 1921.
The village was also famous for its grammar school. Renowned as an academic centre of excellence, Quaker's Yard Grammar School also produced rugby teams of great quality before it was finally closed in the reorganisation of education in the 1970s.
These days Quaker's Yard has regained some of its rural solemnity. Nearby coal mines like Deep Navigation have closed and now the place has only its history and its peaceful aura to sustain it.
The Taff and Trevithick Trails run through the village but, sadly, most of the people who walk or cycle along these long-distance paths have little or no knowledge of the origins of this village with the quaint sounding name.
