1940 in Wales

This article is about the particular significance of the year 1940 to Wales and its people.

← 1939 1938 1937 1936 1935 1940 in Wales → 1941 1942 1943 1944 1945
Centuries:	18th 19th 20th 21st
Decades:	1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s
See also:	List of years in Wales 1940 in The United Kingdom Ireland Scotland

Incumbents

• Prince of Wales – vacant
• Princess of Wales – vacant
• Archbishop of Wales – Charles Green, Bishop of Bangor[1]
• Archdruid of the National Eisteddfod of Wales – Crwys

Events

• 21 January - Lowest ever temperature recorded in Wales, -23.3 °C (-9.9 °F) at Rhayader.[2]
• 27 January - A freak ice storm across the UK brings down telephone and electricity lines in many parts of Wales.[3]
• 3 March - The steamer Cato is damaged by a mine off Nash Point and 13 of the crew are killed.[4]
• March - The scenic railway opens at Barry Island Pleasure Park.
• May
  • The newly created Coalition Government includes Hugh Dalton as Minister of Economic Warfare.[5]
  • Alun Lewis enlists.
• 8 May - Three Nazi German Luftwaffe Heinkel 111s crash in separate incidents over Wales: one near Wrexham, one at Malpas in Denbighshire, and one at Bagillt, Flint. In all nine crew are killed and four captured.
• 3 July - Cardiff is bombed for the first time.
• 9 July - Cardiff suffers its first bombing fatalities.[6]
• 10 July - Ten people are killed in an air raid on Swansea Docks, as shipping convoys become a target.[7]
• 11 July - Communist minister and poet Thomas Evan Nicholas ("Niclas y Glais") and his son are arrested and interned for "endeavouring to impede recruitment to HM Forces". Nicholas is eventually released on 20 October.[8]
• 11 August - Seventeen people are killed in an air raid on Manselton, Swansea.
• 14 August - Three German Heinkel 111s are shot down during an air-raid on Cardiff, and another over North Wales after a raid on RAF Hawarden.
• 22 August - A steamer, the Thorold, is sunk by German aircraft off the Skerries. Ten crew are killed.
• 2 September - 33 people are killed in an air raid on Swansea.
• 3 September - Eleven people are killed in an air raid on Cardiff.
• 4 September - A German Junkers 88 crashes near Machynlleth. Four crew and a Gestapo officer are captured.
• 13 September - A German Heinkel 111 crashes into a house in Newport, Monmouthshire.
• 22 November - The steamer Pikepool is damaged by a mine off Linney Head, Pembrokeshire, with the loss of 17 crew.
• The Urdd changes its policy to include 16- to 25-year-olds.
• Gwilym Williams becomes chaplain of St David's College, Lampeter.
• Percy Cudlipp becomes editor of the Daily Herald.
• Alun Talfan Davies and his brother Aneirin found the publishing house Llyfrau'r Dryw.

Arts and literature

• Lewis Casson directs John Gielgud in King Lear.

Awards

• National Eisteddfod of Wales (held in Bangor (radio))
• National Eisteddfod of Wales: Chair - withheld
• National Eisteddfod of Wales: Crown - T. Rowland Hughes
• National Eisteddfod of Wales: Prose Medal - withheld

New books

• Richard Bennett - Cyfrol Goffa Richard Bennett
• Clara Novello Davies - The Life I Have Loved
• David Delta Edwards - Rhedeg ar ôl y Cysgodion
• John Cowper Powys - Owen Glendower (U.S. publication)
• Howard Spring - Fame is the Spur
• Ransom Riggs - Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children (published 2011; partially set in Wales, 1940)

Music

• Mai Jones & Lyn Joshua - "We'll Keep a Welcome" (performed for the first time in the forces' variety show, Welsh Rarebit on 29 February)
• Grace Williams - Fantasia on Welsh Nursery Tunes (score dated 9 February)

Film

• March 25 - Plaza Cinema opens in Port Talbot.[9]
• April 6 - Paul Robeson and Rachel Thomas star in The Proud Valley (cinematic release)

Broadcasting

• 25 February - The Proud Valley is the first film to have its première on radio, when the BBC broadcasts a 60-minute version.[10]
• May - The BBC Radio Variety Department relocates to Bangor because of wartime disruption; it will broadcast from here until August 1943.[11]
• August - The National Eisteddfod of Wales is broadcast on the British Home Service, including 15 minutes each for the crown and chair ceremonies.[12]

Sport

• Football
  • 13 April - Wales defeat England 1 - 0.
• Quoits - Jack Price wins the Welsh championship for the third time.

Births

• 4 January - Brian Josephson, theoretical physicist[13]
• 17 January - Leighton Rees, darts champion (died 2003)[14]
• 23 January - Ted Rowlands, politician
• 1 March - David Broome, show jumping champion[15]
• 16 May - Sir Gareth Roberts, physicist (died 2007)
• 7 June - Tom Jones, singer
• 29 June - John Dawes, rugby player[16]
• 17 July - C. W. Nicol, Japanese writer and environmentalist (died 2020 in Japan)
• 3 September - Eduardo Hughes Galeano, Uruguayan writer of Welsh descent
• 12 September - Patrick Mower, Welsh-descended actor
• 20 September - Anna Pavord, gardening writer
• 14 October - Christopher Timothy, actor (in Bala, Gwynedd)[17]
• 4 November - Daniel Sperber, Talmudic scholar
• 30 November - Peter Shreeves, footballer, coach, and manager
• 5 December
  • Michael Jones, medieval historian
  • "Exotic" Adrian Street, professional wrestler
• 24 December - John Marek, politician
• date unknown
  • Donald Evans, Welsh-language poet[18]
  • Keith Miles, detective novelist and screenwriter

Deaths

• 12 February - William Edwards, educationist, 89[19]
• 21 February - Sir Alfred Edward Lewis, banker, 71[20]
• 15 March - John Davies, author, 71
• 20 March - William Thomas Edwards (Gwilym Deudraeth), poet
• 7 April - Ernest Rowland, priest and Wales international rugby player, 75
• 27 April - Fred Cornish, Wales international rugby player
• 23 May - Hugh Hesketh Hughes, polo player, 37 (killed in action)[21]
• 4 June - Owen Picton Davies, businessman and politician, 68
• 25 June - Stanley Winmill, Wales international rugby union player, 51
• 3 July - George Bevan Bowen, landowner, 82[22][23]
• 8 August - Daniel Lleufer Thomas, lawyer and biographer, 76[24]
• 20 August - Henry Maldwyn Hughes, Wesleyan minister
• 26 September - W. H. Davies, poet and author, 69[25]
• 9 October - Sir Wilfred Grenfell, medical missionary to Newfoundland and Labrador
• 9 November - Gwilym Owen, physicist
• 15 December
  • Robert Thomas Jones, quarrymen’s leader, 66[26]
  • Sir David Richard Llewellyn, 1st Baronet, industrialist

See also

• 1940 in Northern Ireland

References

1. C. J. Litzenberger; Eileen Groth Lyon (2006). The Human Tradition in Modern Britain. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 92. ISBN 978-0-7425-3735-4.
2. Simons, Paul (2008). Since Records Began. London: Collins. pp. 205–7. ISBN 978-0-00-728463-4.
3. Stephen Moss (26 January 2018). "Weatherwatch: 1940 Ice Storm added to misery of war". The Guardian. Retrieved 8 April 2019.
4. "Porthcawl's Guinness shipwreck remembered". BBC News Wales. 19 September 2015. Retrieved 8 April 2019.
5. Sheila Lawlor (12 May 1994). Churchill and the Politics of War, 1940-1941. Cambridge University Press. p. 36. ISBN 978-0-521-46685-1.
6. Edwin Webb; John B. Duncan (1990). Blitz Over Britain. Spellmount. p. 95. ISBN 978-0-946771-89-9.
7. Julitta Rydlewska; Barbara Braid (18 September 2014). Unity in Diversity, Volume 1: Cultural Paradigm and Personal Identity. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. p. 69. ISBN 978-1-4438-6729-0.
8. "Thomas Evan Nicholas 1879-1971" (PDF). National Library of Wales. Retrieved 6 September 2019.
9. "Plaza Cinema, Talbot Road, Port Talbot". Cinema Treasures. Retrieved 2017-06-14.
10. Stephen Bourne (30 November 2001). Black in the British Frame: The Black Experience in British Film and Television Second Edition. A&C Black. p. 28. ISBN 978-0-8264-5539-0.
11. British Broadcasting Corporation (1944). BBC Handbook. p. 50.
12. "Literature Wales: Encyclopedia - Broadcasting". Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2013-01-05.
13. "Brian D. Josephson Biographical". The Nobel Prize. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
14. "Leighton Rees". The Telegraph. 10 June 2003. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
15. Julia Longland (1 October 1978). Clear round!: Interviews. Mayflower Books. p. 112. ISBN 978-0-8317-0012-6.
16. John Dawes rugby profile ESPN Scrum.com
17. Screen International Film and TV Year Book. Screen International, King Publications Limited. 1990. p. 220. ISBN 978-0-900925-21-4.
18. Donald Evans (16 December 1991). Rhydwen Williams. University of Wales Press. p. 83.
19. Edgar William Jones. "Edwards, William (1851-1940), H.M. inspector of schools". Dictionary of Welsh Biography. National Library of Wales. Retrieved 9 November 2019.
20. Edward Morgan Humphreys. "Lewis, Sir Alfred (Edward) (1868-1940), banker". Dictionary of Welsh Biography. National Library of Wales. Retrieved 9 November 2019.
21. "Hugh Hesketh Hughes". Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Retrieved 11 April 2011. Regiment/Service: Welsh Guards Date of Death: 23/05/1940 Service No: 103800 Casualty Type: Commonwealth War Dead
22. ‘BOWEN, Sir George Bevan’, Who Was Who, A & C Black, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing plc, 1920–2007; online edn, Oxford University Press, Dec 2007 accessed 30 Nov 2013
23. Obituaries (Obituaries) The Times Friday, Jul 05, 1940; pg. 7; Issue 48660; col E
24. David Williams. "Thomas, Sir Daniel Lleufer (1863-1940), stipendiary magistrate". Dictionary of Welsh Biography. National Library of Wales. Retrieved 9 November 2019.
25. Lawrence Normand (1 September 2003). W.H. Davies. Seren. p. 152. ISBN 978-1-85411-261-3.
26. David Thomas. "Jones, Robert Thomas (1874-1940), Labour leader". Dictionary of Welsh Biography. National Library of Wales. Retrieved 9 November 2019.