THE DEATH OF LADY LLANOFER
(From the South Wales Daily News, Friday, January 24th, 1896)

LADY LLANOVER,
LARGE AND REPRESENTATIVE CONCOURSE.
SYMPATHY FROM THE ROYAL FAMILY.
EI CHLADDU YN GYMRAEG.
[Her Burial in Welsh]
(By our Special Correspondent)

Lady Llanover's ruling passion was her ardent love for the ancient language of the Cymry. For the best part of the 95 years of her pilgrimage on earth she spoke that tongue and devoted time and money to foster and encourage it, and, at her expressed wish, the solemn rites observed yesterday at Llanover, when all that remained of her Ladyship were reverently deposited in the tomb besides her late Lord, were conducted entirely from first to last in the language of the people of Wales. The Welshmen and Welshwomen present realised to the full the gaping void which her death had created; they mourned the loss of a considerate landowner, but a more bitter pang was the thought that Wales was deprived of a long and steadfast friend, whose love of country had been something far more precious and real than an empty and vapid sentiment. The thought that was uppermost in every mind, and it came with telling-force, was crystallised in the phrase, "We shall never look upon her like again."
It was a heavy and oppressive. The morning dawned with every indication of a storm, but the rain-clouds rolled away only to be succeeded by a thick overhanging mist that enwrapped the country as in a shroud. The midday trains were heavily laden with tenants who were assembling from far and near to pay their last tribute of respect to an indulgent and beloved meistress tir. [landowner]
For many hours the roads leading from Abergavenny, Penpergwm, Nantyderi, and Pontypool towards Llanover Park were traversed by a continuous stream of mourners, on foot, on horseback, and in vehicles, all without exception attired in the deepest of black. Although the funeral was in a sense a private one, the family had extended a ready permission to tenants who desired to attend, and many hundreds availed themselves of that permission accordingly.                                    

THE COFFIN

Shortly after 1 o'clock the remains were brought from the bedroom and placed on a bier in the large central hall to the left of the principal entrance. The body lay in a coffin of oak, protected by a shell of lead, the whole being enclosed in Llanover oak, with heavy brass trimmings, the breastplate bearing the inscription:-

LADY LLANOVER,
Born 21st March, 1802,
Died 17th January, 1896,
      Aged 95 years.
"Y gorphwysant oddiwrth eu llafur gan ddisgwyl trugaredd ein Harglwydd Iesu Grist a fywyd tragywyddol."
[They rested from their labour expecting the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ and everlasting life.]

The timber of which the coffin was constructed, it is interesting to note, was grown on the Llanover estate, and was part of the same old material from which the coffin of Lord Llanover was made nearly thirty years ago. The timber had been carefully stored in the carpenter's workshops at Llanover since his Lordship's death. His Lordship's coffin was made by the estate workmen at the Hall; so was that of her Ladyship's, the makers being Elias Francis, Owen Lewis (Madog Mon), and Jones, of Haymead Farm, Abergavenny.

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