Dragon is roaring back

10:27am Thursday 18th January 2007

Comments (4)   Have your say »

THE proud Welsh spirit seemed to have finally died out when an ancient little chapel shut down two years ago.

But now, 33-year-old Paul Jones, enthusiastically attempting to restore the historic links, could soon become the last person to have his marriage blessed in the tucked-away Sutton Oak Welsh Chapel, in Lancots Lane.

And he keeps the legend well alive. For, back in Victorian times, his great-great granddad, Hugh Hughes, was among the early pioneers of the blackened, stone-faced building.

Originally a farmer in Anglesey, he moved to work in Sutton, with droves of other Welshmen, seeking jobs in the expanding copper industry. Hallmarks of the old trade are kept alive by an isolated copper-slag wall and old church buildings in the region.

Paul is to wed Caroline Owen (26) who hails from Scarisbrick, near Ormskirk, but has now settled in Sutton. She shares the secretarial work with Paul's chapel group. The organisation is seeking £50,000 in heritage cash.

After the marriage ceremony, at St Helens Register Office, it is planned to ferry guests to the chapel, in an old-fashioned bus hired from the local transport museum.

Paul, from Oxley Street, says: "I am Welsh, through and through. I'm willing to sacrifice all my time and effort the get the chapel re-opened. Not this time as a place of worship, but as a local museum, information station and for community use."

The interior of the chapel, with its long, low walls and round-topped windows is just a plain oblong shape. "We intend to set up glass-fronted bookshelves along the walls, and have special places for local artefacts."

School and local history groups will be welcomed.

Sutton's once abounding North Wales connection long since died down. "But I have the net out to catch as many local Welsh people as I can", says Paul.

The few remaining chapel trustees, all around the 80 mark, are delighted with the extreme youth and enthusiasm of Paul and Caroline.

The 19th-century copper boom once had its shady sides, linking it with the slave trade.

The entrepreneurial skills of John Mackey, owner of land and collieries in Ravenhead and Thatto Heath, really got things moving. He entered into an agreement in 1779 with the Parys mine company of Anglesey.

The resulting copper was partly used for the African slave trade, shipping out from Liverpool. The metal was made into bangles and manilas, as a means of exchange with the African chiefs.

All that belongs to the distant past, however.

It was more hymn singing and dedicated chapel services for the Welsh in Sutton. Their early meeting were in rented rooms and cottages.

The congregation began to grow and their new meeting place was called The Hole in the Wall.' The congregation had to scramble through a small hole in the wall to get to services, in the rented storeroom of a factory.

The copper industry was eclipsed in 1892 by foreign competition. But the Welsh congregation expanded and they bought what was a Methodist schoolhouse for their services.

The Welsh connection dwindled during the 1920s depression, or through loss of life in two world wars.

And the traditional Welsh language gradually disappeared locally, with only about 10 people at the final meetings.

Now, Paul Jones and Caroline Owen intend to breathe back some Welsh life into the Sutton scene.

Adds Paul: "My little nephews - two-year-old Tyler James Driver and McKenzie, aged one, are our latest recruits. So there is still plenty of good hope."