| Home | Hiraeth blog | Aberfan | Contact |
 |
||
Bereavement |
Bereavement
Up until then [Friday, 7 p.m.] I had hoped that the chapel was a hospital,
but as I went into Bethania people were coming out who had been told
their children had gone. Until I went in I still had hope that they were
just lost. When I went all the pews were covered with little blankets
and under them lay the little children. They picked up the blankets and
showed me every girl until I came to [her] and said she was mine. There
wasn’t a mark on her except a little scratch over her mouth, even
her clothes were clean.
What I missed most was the noise and fun around the house. [My daughter]
was boisterous and full of fun. Our house was as quiet as a mouse after
she’d gone.
Bereaved mother
As soon as the word swept around Aberfan that the bodies were being taken
to Bethania chapel, parents and relatives arrived at the front door. They
waited in a long patient line to be permitted in, to try and identify the
daughter, son, wife, husband, mother or father. Because of the cramped
conditions in which we were operating we could only deal with two sets
of relatives at a time.
When we established the age and sex of the person they were seeking they
were shown all the bodies that matched. The task was not made easier by
the fact that most of the boys wore grey short trousers and the girls a
standard dress and cardigan.
Policeman working at the mortuary
In the night we had to go to see if we could identify her in this chapel.
I’ve never forgotten that. It comes back to me everyday. There’s
some part of the day that that picture comes back to me and I can never
forget that. … All these little bodies wrapped in blankets.
Bereaved father
So they went back, my daughter Angela, and my husband and her husband as
he is now, to look and search for the child. Someone had said that the
child was taken down to Church Village. So they went down to the hospitals
there but no they couldn’t see the child. I knew that when Emlyn
came in the early hours of the morning that [she] was not going to be found.
His face was grey and Angela was terrible, we knew then that the little
one was gone.
Bereaved mother
The streets were silent but for the sound of shuffling feet. Some mourners
wept while others pent up their emotions until they reached the cemetery.
As the funeral singing began, hymn singing drifted down to the village
below where everyone shared in the sorrow. All shops were closed; the doors
of the public houses were bolted and normal life ceased.
At the graveside above, three thousand people gathered to pay their last
respects.
The burial took place in the shadow of the now depleted tip.
Merthyr Express
…
all those little coffins in the grave. It was terrible, terrible.
There was hundreds of people up there. Some screaming, some crying …
Bereaved father
© 2013 Hiraeth - Connecting with the land