Church mats, Colonel Cotton, and the Queen Mother’s basket
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Sisters Rhiannon and Margaret Pritchard were born at Ty’n Pant, lived in Newborough all their lives, and clearly remember when the Marram grass was an income-producing local industry.
“Each woman had her own dune,” explains Rhiannon. In August, the women cut the Marram grass, waiting for it to dry before making into stooks and later taking home to plait and create products.
Margaret adds: “They would go to the dunes every morning, and spent the day cutting the Marram. It was laid out on the dunes to dry in the sun – one hot day could do it – then they’d make the stooks.”
These tall haystack-like constructions were then taken back to the village by horse and cart, and the women plaited the grass into individual braids, which were then sewn together to make mats (including the long ones to lay over the drying hay in the fields), dish mats (under plates) and utilitarian baskets, nets and ropes.
“The women got pennies a day (and their food) to collect and work the grass,” adds Margaret.
“They were in great demand with farmers in Caernarfon, Flint and Denbigh, and some were used in Beaumaris and Llantysilio as church seating on the pews.”
The sisters recall how Marram grass weaving was taught: “Wasn’t there a Mrs Williams who taught grass weaving? And didn’t the Queen Mother get a basket – maybe something to do with the Women’s Institute?”. And, how their father would take the woven products by horse and cart to Deiniolen and Ffestiniog, and sometimes to sell in Caernarfon market – taken across by boat every Saturday.” And Colonel Cotton, who lived in Lon Plas Newydd collected them, too,” adds Rhiannon, musing if perhaps he was an agent gathering them for sale.
After the time of the Marram grass industry had passed, the dunes were increasingly populated by rabbits, creating another income source: “There was a house at Cwininger Mawr, and the farmers used to catch rabbits before the forest was planted, using traps and selling the meat, making a living especially during the war when meat was scarce.”