Dic Penderyn
Help us get…
A Posthumous Pardon for
Dic Penderyn
Contents
- KHS school in South Wales are trying to
get the Welsh Assembly to pardon Dic Penderyn, for a
crime that there was no substantial evidence to hang him.
In 1831 there was a rising in Merthyr. The
people were unhappy because of there poor working and living
conditions. At the time all, or at least most of the people
living in Merthyr worker in coal mines or iron works, they always
had low pay and didn't receive it until about 4-6 weeks of work.
This meant they often got into debt and when they got to far into
debt, the court of requests (people who took other people's
belonging to pay there debts off), would take as many of there
belongings as they needed, to pay the bill.
Things were finally looking up for the people
when they thought they were going to get the vote, and control of
there lives, when "The reform bill" went to the
government. The government turned it away. The entire city of
Merthyr was linked to the iron works in some way, and so when the
demand for iron reduced, the iron masters fired people, and cut
the rest of the people's wages. This was the final straw for the
people. They started rioting to get what they wanted.
- The government wanted someone to hang for
the rioting, and the leader (Lewis Lewis) was pardoned
because he saved someone's life. He was deported to
Australia. In the middle of all the fighting a soldier
called Donald Blake was stabbed in the leg. Blake didn't
see who did this and so can't point the finger at
any-one.
-
A man called James Abbot and another man called James Drew
said they saw Dic Penderyn stab Donald Black in the leg. There
were lots of pieces of evidence to say that he was innocent, but
the government hung him on charges of "attempted
murder".
- It was/is said that James Abbot had had a fight with
Dic Penderyn and had sworn revenge, which he was carrying
out by giving evidence saying that Dic Penderyn is
Guilty. James Drew was in the same job as James Abbot and
was his friend and so might have been giving evidence to
be loyal, we can't be sure.
After the trial and hanging, people said they had seen Dic
Penderyn wearing a blue jacket well away from the scene of the
crime when it supposedly took place. Another man said he saw the
stabbing, and the man that did it was wearing a brown jacket.
Well after the event took place (about 40 years after) a
man called Ieaun Parker confesses on his death bed, that he was
the one that stabbed Donald Blake all those years ago.
We want to get Dic Penderyn a
posthumous pardon (A pardon after death) to clear his name. If
you also agree that this man was innocent then please e-mail us
below saying so.
click the above e-mail address
NEWS UPDATE>
13th March 2000 Home Office to look at Dic Penderyn case
Huw Lewis AM said today that the Home Office have agreed to review the evidence in the case of Dic Penderyn, hanged for wounding a soldier during the 1831 Merthyr Rising, who is widely believed to have been the victim of a miscarriage of justice.
Huw has been examining the evidence presented in the original trial at the Cardiff Assizes in 1831, as part of his campaign to secure a Pardon for Dic Penderyn to mark the Millennium, and believes the verdict could be overturned for a number of reasons.
"Following my investigation into the facts surrounding the case of Dic Penderyn, I believe the original evidence presented to the trial was unsafe, primarily because of the unreliability of the main prosecution witness, but also because of a number of other eyewitness accounts which were never presented during the original trial at the Assizes." Huw commented today. "The Home Office have agreed to re-examine the case, and I will shortly be travelling to London to present them with the evidence I have accumulated. I believe the evidence shows convincingly that Dic Penderyn was innocent of the crime for which he was executed, and I hope the Home Office will grant a Pardon"