Call for help in identifying women in WWI munitions factory photos

THE public are being asked to help identify women in three photographs of a Swansea munitions factory during World War I.

- IAN LEWIS

Historian Dr Gethin Matthews, senior lecturer at the history department at Swansea University, was spurred into trying to find out who the women were after he was lent two photos in which the same woman can be seen in a third photo that appeared in several Welsh newspapers in January 1916.

The photographs depict a group of munitions workers from the Swansea National Shell Factory, which was at the Baldwin Works in Landore, during the conflict.

Two of the photos one of a group of nine women and the other of 37 women belong to the family of one of the women pictured, who now live in Penlan. Their relative pictured is Abigail James.

Dr Matthews had the newspaper photograph in his collection, which is how he started comparing the images.