To mark Penarth History month, Penarth Town Council spoke with local historian Chris Riley, who sheds some light on the history of West House, home of the Town Council.
From its appearance West House, the offices of Penarth Town Council, is a rather grand Victorian town house, and so it was. But it might be much more than that.
West House farm was perhaps the biggest farm in Penarth, at one point over 400 acres. It can be traced back to at least the 17th century. Later it was in the hands of Edward Edwards, the alleged Penarth smuggler, who became one of the area’s first Methodists. On its land he built the Penarth Head Inn.
By the mid-19th century much of the farmland had been built over by the docks and new streets of the town. No longer needed as a farmhouse, West House was leased by James Edwards, an important official in the Penarth Docks, chairman of Penarth Local Board and a man who did much to get the town its pier. He vacated it around 1880, and Frederick Jotham, a Cardiff businessman and prominent liberal politician, moved in.
It now seems that these gentlemen did not destroy the existing farmhouse but rather adapted and extended it, and that much of the fabric of the old building has been retained to the present day. The west wing, now containing the council chamber, is evidently a later addition, apparently built in the 1880s, when the house was added to and altered, but the older parts have a much simpler look.
If this is true, then the building may be the oldest in Penarth, with a history going back to at least the mid-18th century.
Penarth History Month continues through September and further details can be found at https://www.penarthtowncouncil.gov.uk/event/penarth-history-month/#sidebar
