Bethesda(1876)

Welsh Independent / Congregational, Bailey Street, Ton-Pentre

Built: 1878 , Extended or Rebuilt: 1906 [Sittings: 1000]

There is no available evidence to state that Bethesda was a 'Daughter' of its 'near' neighbour of Siloh, Pentre. Yet with many of its eventual initial members attending this cause suggests this to be the case.

  Image by permission of Rhondda Cynon Taf Libraries - Reference: 25573

Bethesda's initial home was a vestry at a cost of ₤400 and named 'Maindy Hall'. It's first chapel was designed by the celebrated Rev. William Jones of Jerusalem, Ton-Pentre. One of many chapels he designed. It was built at a contracted cost of ₤1,950 to seat 650 persons. By no means as grand as the building that was to replace it, this chapel was still more than respectable and you can see it in the photograph on the 'Extra Content' page.
    Apart from The Methodists, whose figures I do believe are broad estimates, chapels do not, generally, record actual attendance beyond their members. But it is probably that as a consequence of The Revival, and despite actual membership rarely exceding 400, the church decided that a larger building was required. This chapel, which still stands today, cost ₤4.393. There is a sequence in BBC Wales 'The Long Street' which reveals its interior and low attendance. Yet the black and white photography can not begin to do justice to the 'no cost spared' pitch-pine and solid oak fittings and mahogony gallery.
    That same television series also features a segment with Bethesda's longest serving minister Thomas Alban Davies who actually served the church twice. On the first occassion he departed with the view of becoming a tutor at Carnarthen Presbyterian College. Hoever tutors were not paid for their service to the college and thus required a church to financially support them. The Rev. Davies could not secure a church so returned to his previous charge to serve them for another 40 plus years until his death in 1972.
    Bethesda would contimue as a church to 1996 despite the fears stated in the MGCS piece that closure was imminent. Maybe those that attended at that time were then meeting in the rear vestry. And as I stated earlier the chapel still stands as an 'ancient monument' to a part of Rhondda's heritage mostly ignored by the current population.

Source Document - MGCS 54/110.