Tamarintoe

Hello!! I hope that you’re all well 🖤

The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

The Argument

Rintrah roars, and shakes his fires in the burden'd air;

Hungry clouds swag on the deep.

Ringry cord and agoes hid fires in the burden' d air;

Once meek, and in a perilous path,

The just man kept his course along

The vale of death.

Roses are planted where thorns grow,

And on the barren heath

Sing the honey bees.

Then the perilous path was planted,

And a river and a spring

On every cliff and tomb,

And on the bleached bones

Red clay brought forth;

Till the villain left the paths of ease,

To walk in perilous paths, and drive

The just man into barren climes.

Now the sneaking serpent walks

In mild humility,

And the just man rages in the wilds

Where lions roam.

Rintrah roars, and shakes his fires in the burden'd air;

Hungry clouds swag on the deep.

“O Lord, here is iniquity.”

The final words of Richard Lewis/ Dic Penderyn, a twenty-three year old miner who was hanged for a crime he did not commit; a scapegoat, a martyr, and a father to have been.

I cannot stop thinking about the history of the Merthyr Rising! I want to write more, and in future times I may. It is one of the most important events in working-class history. The raising of a blood-soaked flag by a working man’s hand, forever associated that symbol with the plight of the working-class. Obviously it is not that act alone which makes it so significant. Primarily, it was the culmination of decades of suffering under a system of exploitation and extraction that shaped South Wales. It enabled the wealthy to accrue more wealth, while the poor withered, poorer still in the shackles of debt slavery and hunger. While the immediate cause of the Merthyr Rising was the sacking of 84 puddlers, the pressures of high taxation, the injustice of the Truck system, unemployment, and social and economic inequality wrought terrible suffering upon industrial communities.

While workers and their families dwelled in what were effectively four walls and a roof and little else, suffering the indignities of cholera and typhus, hunger and exhaustion, ironmasters and coal owners were keen to celebrate their wealth by commissioning the construction of lavish vanity projects like that of Cyfartha Castle. This sprawling hulk of a castle was set upon a hill overlooking the Cyfartha Ironworks and the lodgings of its workers.

The illustration above is pretty self-explanatory, but I would like to hear your thoughts if anything occurs to you!

I shan’t rant any further. Just keep in mind that the history and legacy of the Merthyr Rising is worth knowing. It shaped future working-class protest and organisation, and spawned the enduring heraldry of working-class struggle. However, all too often, the human cost of these struggles seems lost. Perhaps this is my announcement that henceforth I will be working on a continuous project exploring the history of social and industrial protest of the 19th century as this is one of my primary interests. I care deeply about the history of these movements and its people.