| Cefn Golau Cholera Cemetery | |
|---|---|
 The cemetery today | |
| Location | Wales |
| Coordinates | 51°46′N3°16′W / 51.76°N 3.26°W |
| OS grid reference | SO1308 |
  Location in Wales | |
Cefn Golau is a disused cholera cemetery situated on a narrow mountain ridge in the county borough of Blaenau Gwent, and located between Rhymney and Tredegar in south-east Wales. A suburb of Tredegar and a nearby feeder reservoir (or pond) have the same name. The graves date from 1832 to 1855 with many for August and September 1849. [1]
The cholera burial ground dates back to the 19th century. At that time, sporadic outbreaks of cholera occurred in various parts of Britain. The victims were buried in specially designated burial grounds in remote locations because of the mistaken belief that it was caused by contagion instead of being waterborne. [2] [3]
The first major cholera epidemic to strike Tredegar was in 1832–33. This outbreak was part of a world wide pandemic that arrived in England in October 1831. [4] A more serious one followed in 1849 in London where it took over 14,000 lives. It was twice as bad as the outbreak in the 1830s in England and it was also worse in Cefn Golau. There was also a smaller outbreak in 1866. In 1849, the disease had already struck the neighbouring communities of Rhymney in July and Nantyglo in August before reaching the town. As the number of victims rose, scarcely a street in Tredegar remained unaffected. The doctors searched for remedies without success, people left their homes and fled into the countryside while others stayed indoors. Many sought help from their religion and the chapels were packed, but the death toll still mounted. People could appear to be fit in the morning and then be dead by evening. The disease caused so much fear that few people were willing to help bury the victims. With the arrival of colder and wetter weather in the autumn, the number of new infections gradually dwindled. [1] This outbreak killed 52,000 people in England and Wales. [4]
The cemetery is a Scheduled Ancient Monument. The headstones dating from 1832 are few in number, small, with boldly cut scripts and elegant floral designs. The stones from the 1849 outbreak are much larger and more numerous, with most of the deaths dating from the months of August and September when the epidemic was at its peak. There is a single stone dated 1866 when the third outbreak took place - this was the smallest and the last in the area. [1]
This burial ground on its remote windswept site has long been abandoned but a few gravestones still stand in the sheep-nibbled turf. One is a memorial to Thomas James, who died on 18 August 1849, aged 24 years. The inscription reads:
One night and day I bore great pain,
To try for cure was all in vain,
But God knew what to me was best,
Did ease my pain and give me rest. [5]
Some of the gravestones are in English, others in Welsh and some are in a mixture of the two languages. [1]
Blaenau Gwent is a county borough in the south-east of Wales. It borders the unitary authority areas of Monmouthshire and Torfaen to the east, Caerphilly to the west and Powys to the north. Its main towns are Abertillery, Brynmawr, Ebbw Vale and Tredegar. Its highest point is Coity Mountain at 1,896 feet (578 m).
Monmouthshire, also known as the County of Monmouth, is one of thirteen historic counties of Wales and a former administrative county. It corresponds approximately to the present principal areas of Monmouthshire, Blaenau Gwent, Newport and Torfaen, and those parts of Caerphilly and Cardiff east of the Rhymney River.
The Borough of Islwyn was one of five local government districts of Gwent from 1974 to 1996.
Caerphilly County Borough is a county borough in the south-east of Wales. It is governed by Caerphilly County Borough Council.
Tredegar is a town and community situated on the banks of the Sirhowy River in the county borough of Blaenau Gwent, in the southeast of Wales. Within the historic boundaries of Monmouthshire, it became an early centre of the Industrial Revolution in Wales. The relevant wards collectively listed the town's population as 15,103 in the UK 2011 census.
Blaenau Gwent is a constituency in South Wales, represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2010 by Nick Smith of the Labour Party.
Bedwellty is a small village in Caerphilly County Borough in south Wales. The village stands on a ridge of high ground between the Rhymney and Sirhowy valleys. The village comprises a parish church, public house and a few houses. The ancient parish of Bedwellty lay in Monmouthshire and covered a large area. Several industrial and mining towns grew up within the parish boundary, including Ebbw Vale, Rhymney, and Tredegar. These gradually gained administrative independence from Bedwellty between the 1870s and 1890s. A Bedwellty Local Government District was established for the rest of the parish in 1891, becoming an urban district in 1894.
Lambeth Cemetery is a cemetery in Tooting, in the London Borough of Wandsworth. It is one of three cemeteries owned by Lambeth London Borough Council, the others being West Norwood Cemetery and Streatham Cemetery.
The second cholera pandemic (1826–1837), also known as the Asiatic cholera pandemic, was a cholera pandemic that reached from India across Western Asia to Europe, Great Britain, and the Americas, as well as east to China and Japan. Cholera caused more deaths, more quickly, than any other epidemic disease in the 19th century. The medical community now believes cholera to be exclusively a human disease, spread through many means of travel during the time, and transmitted through warm fecal-contaminated river waters and contaminated foods. During the second pandemic, the scientific community varied in its beliefs about the causes of cholera.
The third cholera pandemic (1846–1860) was the third major outbreak of cholera originating in India in the 19th century that reached far beyond its borders, which researchers at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) believe may have started as early as 1837 and lasted until 1863. In the Russian Empire, more than one million people died of cholera. In 1853–1854, the epidemic in London claimed over 10,000 lives, and there were 23,000 deaths for all of Great Britain. This pandemic was considered to have the highest fatalities of the 19th-century epidemics.
Walter Conway was the longstanding secretary of the Tredegar Medical Aid Society in South Wales. This society contributed the model which established the British National Health Service.
Seven cholera pandemics have occurred in the past 200 years, with the first pandemic originating in India in 1817. The seventh cholera pandemic is officially a current pandemic and has been ongoing since 1961, according to a World Health Organization factsheet in March 2022. Additionally, there have been many documented major local cholera outbreaks, such as a 1991–1994 outbreak in South America and, more recently, the 2016–2021 Yemen cholera outbreak.
Tredegar Iron and Coal Company was an important 19th century ironworks in Tredegar, Wales, which due to its need for coke became a major developer of coal mines and particularly the Sirhowy Valley of South Wales. It is most closely associated with the Industrial Revolution and coal mining in the South Wales Valleys.
St Woolos Cemetery is the main cemetery in the city of Newport, Wales situated one mile to the west of the Church in Wales cathedral known by the same name. It contains four chapels, and various ornate memorials dating back to the early Victorian period, and was the first municipally constructed cemetery in England and Wales. It remains in use to this present day as the main cemetery for burials in Newport, and has been used as a filming location for the BBC series, Doctor Who. The cemetery is listed on the Cadw/ICOMOS Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales.
A cholera pit was a burial place used in a time of emergency when the disease was prevalent. Such mass graves were often unmarked and were placed in remote or specially selected locations. Public fears of contagion, lack of space within existing churchyards and restrictions placed on the movements of people from location to location also contributed to their establishment and use. Many of the victims were poor and lacked the funds for memorial stones, however memorials were sometimes added at a later date.
Diseases and epidemics of the 19th century included long-standing epidemic threats such as smallpox, typhus, yellow fever, and scarlet fever. In addition, cholera emerged as an epidemic threat and spread worldwide in six pandemics in the nineteenth century.
Friar's Bush Graveyard is Belfast's oldest Christian burial site, located on the Stranmillis Road in South Belfast.
Wales is served by four police forces, Dyfed–Powys Police, Gwent Police, North Wales Police and South Wales Police.