Blood of the Nation

About the Artist

Working as a Police Officer in South Wales and in particular Cardiff Bay has given Ian a real insight into the stories of tough hard-working people, who grew up through hardship and difficult times.

Today, Ian tells of these stories through his artwork of a prosperous period of Welsh history, starting in the 1890’s when Cardiff Bay was seen as the most successful dockland in the world, exporting coal from the South Wales valleys to countries afar. The Third Marquis of Bute who owned the docks, become the richest man in the world, and the first million-pound cheque was written in Cardiff Bay.

About the Artwork

Two hundred men stopped their bartering and stared in silence as the quill was dipped in the inkwell and slowly made to etch history with the words ‘one million pounds’. 

A signature sealed the deal and the trading floor of the Coal Exchange erupted. They had just witnessed the world’s largest ever cheque to be written, and a vast quantity of Welsh coal had been sold to the French. 

It was 1904 and the heartland of Cardiff Bay was alive. Coal was being mined and transported from the South Wales Valleys south to the richest dockland of the time. Families were fed, communities thrived, and the country prospered. But how long would it last?

View more from the Ian Mackenzie collection here