John Edward Southall, 1855–1928
Publisher, Champion of Welsh Language
The son of John Tertius Southall and Elizabeth Trusted, John Edward was educated at Bootham School.
At a young age he started to learn Welsh and set himself up as a printer in Newport, Monmouth.
He published many books on the teaching of Welsh and became a champion for the language.
Born in Corn Square Leominster, the son of John Tertius Southall and Elizabeth (nee Trusted). John Edward was educated at Weston-Super-Mare and at the Society of Friends’ school at Bootham, Yorkshire.
He started to learn Welsh when he was quite young and became fairly proficient in the use of the language. He settled as a printer at Newport, Monmouth, in 1879, and continued to print and publish books there into the 1920s. Many of his publications were textbooks for use in the schools of Wales and England. He wrote much about the Quaker way of life in titles such as Quakerism as a Factor in the World’s History and Quakerism as a Universal Religion.
He was one of the first people in Wales to realise the value of bilingual education as a means of safeguarding the future of the Welsh language. As an individual and a publisher he made a special study of the problem of the teaching of Welsh language in both Welsh and English speaking districts of the Principality. He saw the need for a complete education through the medium of Welsh in Welsh schools. He started to meet that need by submitting a memorandum on this subject to a royal commission which sat in 1886 and 1887.
Southall was passionate about trying to secure the future of the Welsh language, and more so because it witnessed the decline of the language in Monmouthshire. As well as books for schools, he published many of his own works analysing the position of the Welsh language. In 1897 one of his essays won a prize at the Newport National Eisteddfod.
Five years before, Southall had published Wales and her Language, looking at the country from a historical, educational, and social standpoint. This was followed by two other English books analysing the 1891 and 1901 Language Census Results and remarks on the future of the language in 1895 and 1904; Preserving and teaching the Welsh Language in English speaking districts, 1899. He also published a series of bilingual readers for use in schools in Wales.
The books published by J. E. Southall were undoubtedly important milestones in the history of the development and growth of the Welsh language and the contribution in this respect was significant.
He retired from business in about 1924 and died in Caswell Terrace, Leominster in 1928. His wife was Ann Berry.
