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Tiger Bay (Welsh:Bae Teigr) was the local name for an area ofCardiff which coveredButetown andCardiff Docks. Following the building of theCardiff Barrage, which dams the tidal rivers,Ely andTaff, to create a body of water, it is referred to asCardiff Bay. Tiger Bay is Wales’ oldest multi-ethnic community, with sailors and workers from over 50 countries settling there from the mid-19th century onwards.[1]
Cardiff Docks played a major part in Cardiff's development as it was the means of exportingcoal from theSouth Wales Valleys to the rest of the world, helping to power theIndustrial Age. Thecoal mining industry helped fund the growth of Cardiff to become thecapital city ofWales, and contributed towards making the docks' owner, the3rd Marquess of Bute, the richest man in the world at the time.
In 1794, theGlamorganshire Canal was completed, linking Cardiff withMerthyr, and in 1798 a basin was built, connecting thecanal to the sea. Increasing agitation for proper dock facilities led Cardiff's foremost landowner, the2nd Marquess of Bute, to promote the construction of theWest Bute Dock, which opened in October 1839. Just two years later, theTaff Vale Railway opened. From the 1850s coal supplanted iron as the industrial foundation ofSouth Wales, as theCynon Valley andRhondda Valley weremined.
As Cardiff's coal exports grew, so did its population. Well-appointed residential areas were created in the 1840s and early 1850s, centred aroundMount Stuart Square andLoudoun Square (betweenWest Bute Street and the Glamorganshire Canal) to house the growing numbers of merchants, brokers, builders, and seafarers from across the world settling close to the docks.[2] The area, known as Tiger Bay from the fierce currents around the local tidal stretches of theRiver Severn, became one of the UK's oldest multicultural communities, with migrant communities from over 50 nationalities, includingNorwegian,Somali,Yemeni,Spanish,Italian,Caribbean, andIrish. All the nationalities helped to create the multicultural character of the area, where people from different backgrounds socialised together and intermarried.[3][4] Between the 1940s and 1968, the Cairo Café, run by Yemeni sailor Ali Salaman and his Welsh wifeOlive, became a centre for Tiger Bay's diverse communities, providing a restaurant, a boarding house, and a mosque.[5]
TheEast Bute dock opened in 1859. Coal exports from Cardiff Docks reached 2 million tons as early as 1862; by 1913, this had risen to 10,700,000 tons. Frustration at the lack of development at Cardiff led to rival docks being opened at nearbyPenarth in 1865 andBarry in 1889. These developments eventually spurred Cardiff into action, with the opening of the Roath Dock in 1887 and theQueen Alexandra Dock in 1907. Coal exports from theSouth Wales Coalfield via Cardiff totalled nearly 9 million tons per annum, much of it exported in the holds of locally ownedtramp steamers. The wealthier residents were able to move away to the new Cardiff suburbs. Butetown (particularly the area around Loudoun Square) became crowded, as families took in lodgers and split up the three-storey houses to help pay the rents.[2]
Tiger Bay had a reputation as a tough and dangerous area; but locals who lived and stayed in the area describe a far friendlier place.[6] Merchant seamen arrived in Cardiff from all over the world, only staying for as long as it took to discharge and reload their ships. Consequently, it has been said that the area became thered-light district of Cardiff, and many murders and lesser crimes went unsolved and unpunished, as the perpetrators had sailed away. In reality the primary brothels streets, and the primary red light area, were Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane, both of which were outside Tiger Bay. They were demolished, and the site is now the Marriott Hotel car park.
By 1932, in the depths of theGreat Depression which followed the1926 United Kingdom general strike, coal exports had fallen to below 5 million tons, and dozens of locally owned ships were laid up. It was an era of depression from which Cardiff never really recovered, and despite intense activity at the port during theSecond World War, coal exports continued to decline, finally ceasing in 1964.
Coal exports were key to the local economy, which began to decline in the 1960s, when exports from the docks stopped. Housing clearances in the 1960s relocated many of the residents of Butetown, previously the residential core of the docklands, into unpopular tower blocks.[7]The economic decline in the 1960s and 1970s led to a 25% vacancy rate of buildings and 60% unemployment in Butetown. The infrastructure and buildings in the area declined: by the 1970s and 1980s the area required development and investment.[8]
The price of land in the area decreased as there was a decline in traditional industry. This led to a rise in commercial developments, which were largely celebrated as a regeneration, although they displaced the local multicultural community as homes were demolished.[7]
Around 1999, the area was redeveloped by theCardiff Bay Development Corporation. This redevelopment was focused around the building of theCardiff Bay Barrage, one of the most controversial building projects of the day,[9] which impounded the rivers Taff and the Ely to create a massive freshwater lake. This resulted in the equally controversial renaming of the area as "Cardiff Bay".
The opposition to the development was led on the grounds of removal of communities, and ecological preservation of the mud-flats and salt marshes which were home to wintering birds.[10]
Local historianNeil Sinclair was highly critical of the redevelopment scheme, describing it in 2016 as a "tragedy", and accusing it of creating a "lacklustre council estate; an architectural monstrosity".[11]
Butetown councillor Saeed Ebrahim has commented on the present day repercussions of these developments on the local community:
“The way developments were created was not very healthy, put it that way. The developers created us and them. They never wanted to include their developments in the older people and the older Butetown communities.”
“The development of Cardiff Bay has never included the people of Butetown frankly, and still to this day they are not included into the agenda of businesses. And still, there's a huge divide in the Bay and Butetown.”
The funding available for the existing community was small and the Tiger Bay name was pushed out in favour of Cardiff Bay.
In the redevelopment of the area, some long-standing cultural institutions were closed or demolished to make space for new buildings. In the 1970s, the Industrial and Maritime Museum was built on Bute Street to commemorate the heritage and history of the area. The museum, along with other historical buildings on Bute Street, were demolished in the 1990s to make space for theMermaid Quay shopping and leisure development.[8]
In 1988, coinciding with the creation of the Cardiff Bay Development Corporation, the Butetown History and Arts Centre was created by the Butetown community to preserve the cultural-political heritage of the area. The centre was the site of historical oral recordings, educational events and activities for children and adults, and it also published books.[12] The founder, an American historian named Glenn Jordan, was certain that the centre would remain an integral part of the regeneration project, since the area was deemed to be an example of a harmonious multi-racial community.[13] However, the corporation provided no funding to the centre, and the space had to rely on external charitable funding to keep running.[14] In late 2016, the long-standing institution could not obtain funding and was shut down. Its rich collection of the history of the Tiger Bay needed re-housing, and the last important link for communities that had been cleared out from the area, to make space for the re-generation, was now closed.[14][13]
The BHAC collection has passed to The Heritage & Cultural Exchange, a local community-based organisation.[15]
The name "Tiger Bay" was applied in popular literature and slang (especially that of sailors) to any dock or seaside neighbourhood which shared a similar notoriety for danger.[16]
During theFalklands War in 1982, the Argentine Z-28 patrol boatARA Islas Malvinas GC82 was captured by the Type 42 destroyerHMSCardiff. Brought into service with theRoyal Navy, the crew subsequently renamed herHMSTiger Bay. Stationed inPortsmouth Harbour for a period, she was sold for scrap in 1986.
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