1803 in Wales

This article is about the particular significance of the year 1803 to Wales and its people.

← 1802 1801 1800 1799 1798 1803 in Wales → 1804 1805 1806 1807 1808
Centuries:	17th 18th 19th 20th 21st
Decades:	1780s 1790s 1800s 1810s 1820s
See also:	List of years in Wales 1803 in The United Kingdom Ireland Scotland

Incumbents

• Prince of Wales - George (later George IV)
• Princess of Wales - Caroline of Brunswick

Events

• 26 June - First public assembly of the South Wales Unitarian Association.
• Robert Saunderson of Liverpool settles at Bala and becomes official printer to the Calvinistic Methodist Society, working for Thomas Charles.
• 17 July - Thomas Burgess is consecrated Bishop of St David's.[1]
• September - A new company, the Union Iron World Company, is formed to run Rhymney ironworks, after Benjamin Hall takes it over.[2]
• date unknown
  • Rhys Davies (Y Glun Bren) preaches from the mounting-block in front of the Black Lion Inn at Talybont in Cardiganshire, beginning Independent Methodist activity there.
  • Pascoe Grenfell contracts to trade in copper in the Swansea area.
  • Thomas Johnes sets up a private printing press to publish translations of French medieval chronicles.
  • Dunraven Castle built near Southerndown.
  • Benjamin Heath Malkin begins his travels in South Wales.
  • Paeonia mascula is discovered growing on the island of Steep Holm - the only species of peony native to the British Isles.[3]

Arts and literature

New books

• J. T. Barber - A Tour Throughout South Wales and Monmouthshire
• Robert Davies (Bardd Nantglyn) - Barddoniaeth
• William Owen Pughe - Geiriadur Cymraeg-Saesneg

Music

Births

• 10 May - Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot, owner of Margam Castle (died 1890)[4]
• 29 June - Peter Maurice, priest and writer (died 1878)
• 15 September - Charles Octavius Swinnerton Morgan, politician, historian and antiquary (died 1888)[5]
• 17 October - Samuel Holland, industrialist (died 1892)
• 18 October - Sir Richard Green-Price, 1st baronet, Liberal politician (died 1887)
• 23 November - Edward Edwards, zoologist (died 1879)
• date unknown
  • Dafydd Jones (Dewi Dywyll), balladeer (died 1868)
  • Owain Meirion, balladeer (died 1868)

Deaths

• 2 January - Sir Richard Perryn, judge, 79[6]
• 29 April - Thomas Jones, landscape painter, 60[7]
• 3 June - Lord George Murray, Bishop of St David's and developer of the UK's first optical telegraph, 42[8]
• 28 September - Ralph Griffiths, editor and publisher, 83?[9]
• date unknown - Thomas Evans, London bookseller, 64[10]

References

1. The Imperial Magazine, Or, Compendium of Religious, Moral, & Philosophical Knowledge. 1825. p. 689.
2. Arthur Clark (1962). The Story of Monmouthshire. C. Davies. p. 80. ISBN 978-0-9506618-0-3.
3. "The Peony Society - Steep Holm". Archived from the original on 28 July 2011. Retrieved 12 January 2011.
4. John Hodgson; John Hodgson-Hinde (1827). A History of Northumberland: The topography and local antiquities, arranged in parishes. 3 v. E. Walker. p. 212.
5. History of the collection, British Museum, accessed July 2010
6. "Perryn, Richard" . Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.
7. Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion (London, England) (1984). The Transactions of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion. The Society.
8. John Hodgson; John Hodgson-Hinde (1827). A History of Northumberland: The topography and local antiquities, arranged in parishes. 3 v. E. Walker. p. 212.
9. James King (1 April 1999). Faking. Dundurn. p. 28. ISBN 978-1-55488-529-9.
10. Robert Thomas Jenkins. "Evans, Thomas (1739-1803), and Evans, Thomas (1742-1784), two London booksellers". Dictionary of Welsh Biography. National Library of Wales. Retrieved 6 February 2020.