[John Robert Jones aka Jack Morgan]
In this world of constant challenges, military conflicts, and life’s demands, we all walk a path of unknown dangers. Few of us will avoid facing tragedies and loss. It’s unexpected, no goodbyes nor last words of love. Delayed shock and lasting family voids.
My family were no exception. On my maternal side of the family, there were three tragedies in three years, from 1934 to 1937.
In September 1934, my Taid* John Robert Jones, at the age of 55, was one of the 266 men and boys killed in the Gresford Mine Disaster. My mother, Mair Jones, was born in a small terraced house in Ffynnongroew ** along with her four brothers and two sisters (one, Alice, died at birth). Her mother, my Nain** Harriet Jones (nee Williams), was born in Abergele.
Ffynnongroew *** is a small village, a short distance from Mostyn on the North Wales coast road, A548, with the Point of Ayr coal mine close by. A mine that ran on under the sea and by its situation, regular work could not be guaranteed. Flooding, roof falls, gases detected, led to uncertainty, and my Taid was persuaded by his older sister to bring his family to Wrexham where a number of coal mines were offering work.
They eventually settled in the new model village of Llay, a council house on the edge of the Alyn valley, directly opposite the village of Gresford.
My poem below contains aspects of the working conditions at the coal face told to my mother by her father and passed on to me. An emotional conflict transpired, as the following day was set for the town’s annual carnival and a local derby football match.
This blog, and my poem, is a tribute to all miners killed in mining disasters and to their families and friends who mourn.
This poem THE TAID I NEVER KNEW is in my POEMS BY AN OLD CODGER – BOOK ONE.
*Welsh for Grandfather
** Welsh for Grandmother
*** Welsh for a Well with clear pure water. My mother lived in Well Street.
THE TAID I NEVER KNEW
Miner John Robert Jones of Ffynnongroyw,
Made a move we all since rue.
He took my Nain and children too,
To the Welsh east border where coal seams grew.
He settled above the Alyn valley so steep,
To hew out coal two thousand feet deep,
At Gresford colliery across the green valley
Where near two thousand men had an underground tally.
They came from villages old and new,
For other jobs were rare and few.
The Dennis shaft took fresh air down for men to suck
As each one filled a two wheeled truck.
My mother learnt from Taid of their unbearable state,
They knew the risks and their possible fate.
Machinery noise and dust and fumes,
The growing smell of death that would consume.
This pit so hot they sweated in thin pants or less,
Or worked waist high in water of a dirty mess.
They strained their eyes in the dust and dark,
Their conditions were brutal and quite stark.
The ultimate happened on a Saturday morning,
At two o’clock, flames swept through so alarming,
Two Hundred and Sixty-Two met their death,
They didn’t even have time to catch their breath.
Too many men were working that Dennis patch,
As some had swapped their day shift, to watch
The Carnival and ‘Derby Match’ in town that day.
We should remember all their souls and pray.
Three of the Rescue Team were killed by gas,
And one surface worker died by an unexpected blast.
The final toll was Two Hundred and Sixty-Six souls,
Needless deaths as the village church bell tolls.
That torrid day the land stood still, as death hovers
Over wives and mothers, friends, and brothers,
Sons and daughters and many more
Frozen in shock, despair and sore.
The pit was sealed, evidence that none had survived,
No bodies to bury, just memories of when they lived.
Funds raised; tributes paid; questions, enquiries made.
We cannot let the sacrifice by those honest miners’ fade.
The skylarks sang that Saturday morn,
High above the valley and fields of corn.
I heard those larks sing as there I grew,
Over the grave of the Taid I never knew.
Copyright 2023 Neil Davies
An account of one pit disaster of which there were many over the years.
One of the three family tragedies.
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Take care, stay safe
Neil.