Llanychaer - Griffiths family of 'Panteg'
John Griffiths and his wife Sarah lived for many years at Panteg, Llanychaer. John, better known as Jack y Bance, had been born at Gilfach in 1885, a farm just a little higher up the hill than Panteg. Like many young men at that time in the early part of the 20th century, he left the local area to work in the collieries of South Wales. Working conditions in the pits were both hard and very dangerous and John was working at the Cambrian Colliery in Clydach Vale in 1905 when a serious explosion took the lives of 33 miners. Jack was one of the 14 men who were rescued but who were seriously injured – having been burnt in the explosion.
In 1910, John married Sarah Hughes who was a widow with 3 young children. Sarah and her husband Edward had been born in Merionethshire but had migrated to the South Wales valleys for work. They had four children but Beatrice died as young baby and soon after, so did husband Edward. Having married Sarah, John took on a ready made family of two sons, David and Robert and a daughter, Doris.
1910 was the time of the Tonypandy Riots and living in Clydach Vale and with John working at the Cambrian Colliery, the family would have been at the heart of the dispute.
By 1915, John and Sarah had three daughters of their own and had decided to leave the valleys and raise their family back in Llanychaer. So with their six children they settled at the small holding, Panteg.
It is said that each Thursday he would go to Fishguard in his pony and trap to sell eggs and homemade butter from his smallholding and enjoy a drink at the Cambrian Inn.
The family were well known in Llanychaer having lived at Panteg from around 1913 until the death of first, Sarah in 1961 and then Jack in 1973.
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