Buttrills

Buttrills
District of Barry and ward
Near the bottom of Buttrills Road, Barry
Map of Buttrills. Click three times to view clearly.
Buttrills Location in Barry
Coordinates: 51°24′32″N 3°16′43″W / 51.40889°N 3.27861°W / 51.40889; -3.27861
Country	United Kingdom
Region	Wales
County	Vale of Glamorgan
Town	Barry
Population (2011)
• Total	6,357
Time zone	GMT (UTC+0)

Buttrills is a northwestern-central district of Barry in the Vale of Glamorgan, in south Wales. It is also a formal electoral ward of the Vale of Glamorgan, the population of which taken at the 2011 census was 6,357. The centre of education in Barry in the early twentieth century, Buttrills today contains notable playing fields (known as The Butts) and Barry Cemetery.

The origin of the word Buttrills is uncertain. 'Butt' is a word for an archery shooting range, and popular legend has it that the large playing field known as 'the Butt's, adjoining Barry Cemetery, was used as a practice range by archers in the Middle Ages. Welsh longbowmen were renown for their skill, and played a key role in defeating the French at Agincourt in 1415. 'Butt' is also a Middle English word for a strip of land between roads, or a corrner or 'rump' of land. 'Rill' means a brook or rivulet, or shallow channel cut into the surface or soil or rocks by running water (a small stream, the Coldbrook, rises in a valley adjoining 'the Butts' to the north).

Before the mid 19th century, Buttrills was a rural area, consisting of several farms. The area in what is now the Barry Memorial Hall and post office at the intersection with Holton Road of Barry once contained two farmhouses, one of them was named Holton Fawr Farm. Butt-Lee Court was erected on what used to be Buttrills Farm and House. Notably it was the home of the Reverend Sims, a close friend of the leader of the anti-slavery campaign, William Wilberforce. The property was sold in 1869 to John Treharne, a wealthy gentleman who also owned Friars Point House and was responsible for building a pier at Barry Island. Treharne completed the house in 1871 but later sold it to the American Consul in Cardiff, Colonel Harry Davies.

Following this, urban sprawl, fuelled by the coaling industry, engulfed the area and by the mid 20th century the area was fully urbanized. During the heavy industrial period, Buttrills Hill was considerably more congested today, with loaded lorries carrying heavy goods; problematic as it was reported to have caused accidents and damage to residential property. St. David's Methodist Church of Barry (now in Colcot) has its origins in the district of Buttrills in the 1920s when a congregation began to meet for worship in two old huts. From around 1920 for a number of years, the British military also ran Buttrills Camp in the area for the treatment and recuperation of the wounded.