The Bust of Rev. William “Crwys” Williams

One of Swansea Libraries’ greatest treasures which can easily be seen is the bronze bust of the famous local poet Crwys Williams which can be found at the rear of the Local Studies section on the first floor of the Central Library.

The poet Rev. William "Crwys" Williams (4 January 1875 - 13 January 1968), was a three-time winner of the Bardic Crown (1910, 1911, 1919) at the National Eisteddfod of Wales. He was born and brought up in Craig Cefn Parc, Mawr. Crwys took his bardic name from the Independent Chapel “Pant-y-crwys” he attended as a child and where he was buried. He is regarded as one of the best-known Welsh language poets of the twentieth century creating popular poems like ‘Melin Trefin’, inspired by a disused Pembrokeshire mill, and ‘Y Border Bach’.

Trefin Mill in Pembrokeshire

He served as Archdruid of the National Eisteddfod from 1939 to 1949, his extended term of office caused by the Second World War, making him the longest serving Archdruid ever. Crwys served for most of his working life as minister at Rehoboth Independent Church in Brynmawr, Brecon. He then retired to Swansea, but accepted the call to serve as minister to Rhyddings Congregational Chapel in Uplands from 1946-1953. Crwys still has family members living locally in Swansea.

A bronze plaque in Welsh featuring some of Crwys’s poetry is attached under the bust it reads:

CRWYS

(1875-1968)

Pregethwr Bardd Esisteddfodwr

Llundain, Rhufain, Parys falch,

- Abertawe i mi bob tro.

Tref fy mebyd cynnar yw.

This can be translated as:

CRWYS

(1875-1968)

Minister, Poet, Eisteddfod-goer

‘London, Rome, proud Paris

- Swansea’s the place for me every time.

It is the town of my early childhood’.

[Llandysul : Gomer, 1994.]

We will discuss the sculptor of the bust Jenkin “Tawe” Evans and how Swansea Libraries came to own it in part two of this blog.