The Gift of a Family Bible
One day in April 2024, I was looking through one of the family history pages on Facebook when I saw a post which caught my eye. It mentioned a William Cross living in the Hafod, which is part of Swansea where I live and grew up. I thought: William Cross? That’s my great-grandfather.
Cross isn’t a common name in Swansea and my great-grandfather was originally from Huntingdonshire. The lady who wrote the post was looking for relatives of William Cross. She had a Bible and she wanted to return it to the family. From what I could gather she and her family had moved into the house in Grandison Street where my grandparents had lived. She’d found the Bible in the house.
I phoned her and explained who I was and we arranged to meet. She gave me the Bible and I was in tears. When I saw it, I thought: I’ve seen this before. I must have seen it when I was a youngster.
William Cross was born in 1840. I couldn’t find out when he came to Swansea, but my daughter and I found him there in the 1871 census. He married Mary Thomas in 1871 in St Mary’s church. She was from Walton in Pembrokeshire and was working in Swansea, I’m assuming as a domestic. He was living in the same area of the town. They moved into 11 Grandison Street where all the children were born. My grandfather, Walter, was their youngest child.
I was thrilled to have my great-grandfather’s Bible, because it’s part of him. It was given to him. On the front page is written: “William Cross, his book, a present from his loving mother.” The Bible is very frail. I’m almost afraid to handle it. I would like to have it re-bound, but it wouldn’t have the same character. Even though it’s all dog-eared and broken, you can still make out who it belonged to. It gives me a bit of insight into my great-grandparents. They died before I was born.
The Bible has a list of the children in the front. I knew who they were because I’d heard of them. And my grandfather was there, so it was my close family. But among the list of children there were two I didn’t know anything about. I’ve since taken their names to the temple, so I think the family is now complete. And I think that’s why the Bible came to me.