The Newport And South Wales Tube Company Ltd Check
Item reference number: 265
Ob: THE N & S W T Co LTD / NEWPORT MON / WETTER. J. A.
Rv: 6624
35mm Round/Bakelite?
Originally "THE BRITISH WELDLESS TUBE COMPANY LTD" then "THE BRITISH MANNESMANN TUBE COMPANY LTD." Around 1936 it became "THE NEWPORT AND SOUTH WALES TUBE COMPANY LTD". Finally in 1943 it was taken over by "STEWARTS & LLOYDS LTD." Closed around 1970. The site produced weldless steel tubes.
The check probably dates to around 1940
We have looked into the background of JA Wetter:
James Alfred Wetter (1905-1953)
James Alfred Wetter was born in Newport on 1 February 1905.
In 1911, at the age of six, he was living with his family in Bolt Street. His father worked as a dock labourer, one of the many men whose livelihoods depended on Newport's busy docks and the trade that passed through them.
Ten years later, James was living with his father and siblings in Raglan Street. By then, he had embarked on a very different working life. The 1921 Census described him as an unemployed seaman who had been working for the Argentine Line. His early experience of the sea suggests that, while still a young man, he had already ventured beyond Newport in search of employment.
By 1939, James had returned to work on land. He was living in Westfield Avenue, Malpas, and was employed as a stacker at a steelworks, probably the Newport & South Wales Tube Company at Corporation Road. If this identification is correct, his working life had brought him from Newport's maritime trade into the town's heavy industry.
James's connection with the sea was not at an end, however. During the Second World War, he served in the Merchant Navy, whose ships played a vital role in carrying food, raw materials and other essential supplies to Britain throughout the conflict.
James Alfred Wetter died in 1953, aged just 48. His life, spanning the first half of the twentieth century, reflects several important strands of Newport's history: the close-knit streets of its working-class communities, employment around the docks, the uncertainties of seafaring, the growth of the steel industry and the demands of wartime service at sea.
