Oyster Industry: The Victorian Oystermen of Mumbles
by Carol Powell MA
Skiffs at the Horsepool Harbour, Mumbles, 1870
The 1871 census registers a preponderance of ‘old’ Mumbles names among the 600 or so sea-going men, who would have used the Horsepool harbour then. Most of them are recognizable to us today—Ace, Bydder, Davies, Evans, Eynon, Gammon, Givelin, Hoskins, Howell, Hullin, Jenkins, Llewellyn, Michael, Rogers, Smith, Webborn and Williams and some wonderfully charismatic ones such as Silvanus Bevan, Noah Davies, Solomon Howell, Hezakia Watkins and Reuben Webborn.
Among the Skiff Owners in the 1880s were
Captain Barrett, W., Sailors' Home, Swansea; Bennett, Susanna, Beaufort Arms; Bennett, W., Sheffield Place; Bevan, W., Park Street; Burt, W.; Davies, D.; Davies, J., Commercial Place; Davies, L.; Davies, Martha, Southend; Evans, D., Sheffield Place; Gammon, James, Clifton Terrace; Gammon, Richard, Clifton Terrace; Howells, D., Southend; Jenkins, James; Jenkins, Jenkin, Clifton Terrace; Jones, John, Sea View; Jones, Matthew, Westward Lane; Lloyd, D., Church Park; Lloyd, James, Overland; Matthews, J., Sheffield Place; Michael, D. E., Sheffield Place; Morgan, W., Clifton Terrace; Morris, W.; Powell, Stephen, Clifton Place; Powell, W., Oddfellows' Inn; Thomas, Hewitt, Gower Place; Thomas, John, Horsepool; and Webborn, J., Glass Row.
The Marine Hotel overlooking the Horsepool Harbour, c 1870
By 1891, George Dowman, the Licensed Victualler at the Marine lived there with his wife, Hannah and their three daughters, a general servant and a barmaid. Nearby on the water’s edge were two fishermen’s cottages, one occupied at that time by William and Jane Jenkins and their son, Alfred and the other by Thomas Llewellyn and his wife, Martha.
These, then, were just some of the people who lived and worked near the Horsepool through the years and whose surroundings would soon be changed forever by the extension of the Mumbles Railway.
The remains of an Oyster skiff (boat)
The wrecked remains of several oyster skiffs (boats), which lie near the sea wall and are a small, but constant reminder of a proud and hard-working band of men, who once worked in this thriving centre of our past sea-going community.
Acknowledgmonts
1871 and 1891 censuses
Butcher's Trade Directory 1881