Hi Pauline, Back on the trail again, the Carmarthenshire antiquary Vol XXX11 1996 turned out to be a veritable goldmine, not just anthracite, for research into my Grandparents Vivian and Howell roots. I had traced Vivian (tinsmith and GAS FITTER) tentatively to 1802 and then lost in Cornwall and Howell back to Llechrydd at about the same time. While I have not done proof positive of the link between the Howell Family of Llanelli and that of Ffynnon Felin certainly one of their number was the Port collector at that time and there is a remarkable best fit between aural memory and written one, in terms of their non professions but well placed identity. We have always known our link with the Buckley brewery family and here he/she is Kemmis Buckley heading the research paper. Lots to work on there. Vivian, more humble people are yet more interesting still and not descended from the King of Wales and a lot rarer surname too in Cymru. Father did some research in Bath in the 1960s (hard slog) and was firmly of the opinion that his gggf had worked with William (miners lamp fame) Davey. Looking at the research in to the Carmarthen gas lighting project 1802 (Cam was one of the first towns to get gas lighting) I discover that William Murdoch was not only the work partner of this said ancestor in Cornwall but also in Carmarthen. The Sara Vivian who died in 1807 in Carmarthen almost certainly died in childbirth and was the wife of the Thomas who came from Cornwall with William Murdoch in the 1790s. He then moved to Bath and his grandson born in 1837 moved BACK to Llanelli in about 1865. He was my Grandmother's father. This detail may have been researched by others seeing it from a slightly different angle and if anybody knows of it please let me know. It was only a glimmer in my eye that his Father/GF had been living in Llanelli and that was why he moved back there in 1865, but with the knowledge of the Carmarthen gas mantle project in 1802 it becomes much, much clearer! He had a large and lively family remembered to this day, and died round the turn of the 19th/20thC. My grandmother ran the pub called the Brose Arms after the name of the Estate owned by people she thought to be distant relatives. Her Father was after all a William Henry Vivian, with EXACTLY the same name as the son and heir of the Foundry business! Thus it does again seem possible that there is a junior branch of the Vivian family founders of the smelting business, who were mere publicans, plumbers and gas fitters by the late 19thC. Even so Vivian was a fairly common name in Redruth but not in Wales! There is now little doubt that my GGGGGF worked with James Watt junior in the Bolton and Watt firm but more importantly in the experiments done in the home of William Murdoch in Redruth, home which is now a museum, where Murdoch first controlled the use of gas for very effective lighting in the home. It was quite soon after this that Murdoch services were requested by the Carmarthen corporation to supply public gas mantles in the town. In 1807 Sarah Vivian died in Carmarthen. It is not stated on the Bath registers whether Thomas Vivian, father of William (b 1837) was actually born in Bath, and it's most likely that he was in fact the child of that one female Vivian residing in Carmarthen at that time. A tin smith was indispensable for building engines, very useful for making gas mantles, had excellent knowledge of the tin mines and even of the serious problems of deep mines which led Davey to invent the miner's lamp where the lamp went out in the presence of gas. WH Vivian was proud to be the son of a tin smith,a Vivian,a gas fitter and plumber. 1837-1896(?)