Idris Davies was a Welsh coal miner and a friend of Dylan Thomas.Pete said that he first came across the words to Bells of Rhymney reprinted in one of Thomas's essays "So Early One Morning". Idris after the failure of the general strike of 1926 studied nights for four years eventualy becoming a school teacher in London and published three slim volumes of poetry,He died of cancer at the age of 44.
there is also another bells song from the west country but I ca'nt remember the name off hand.