Wales Remembers
the Aberfan Disaster
By EIFION WILLIAMS
Stories and personal recollections in the media during last month's fortieth anniversary of the Aberfan disaster showed that the grief and horror surrounding the tragedy had diminished very little.
 |
|
ON OCTOBER 21, 1966, 144 people, 116 of them children, were killed when a tip of coal waste slid onto the village of Aberfan in South Wales.
|
On a foggy October morning in 1966, a huge coal tip slid down a hillside overlooking the small South Wales village of Aberfan, burying in its path two farmhouses, a number of terraced houses and most of Pantglas Junior School. The thousands of tons of moving coal waste killed 144 people, 116 of them children.
People in the South Wales mining valleys had long been accustomed to the ugly ravages of the coal industry. Over the years, they had seen many lives lost due to tragic accidents deep underground and thousands of miners had been condemned to a slow death from inhaling coal dust. But Aberfan was different. This time it killed their children.
Events following the disaster are forever ingrained in the memories of those who followed the world-wide media coverage. Expressions of sympathy and contributions to the Aberfan Disaster Fund came in from all over the world, eventually totalling £1.75 million.
Volunteer rescuers came from many parts of the United Kingdom to dig alongside local miners, some of whom were digging in hope of finding their own children. Hardened reporters wept openly as they described scenes of women being gently led away after furiously scrabbling at the black slurry in attempts to locate their children.
One of the heart-rending reports was the discovery of the body of the school's deputy headmaster, Mr. Beynon, who was found with his arms enveloping five children as though trying to protect them.
It took many days to clear the waste and recover all the bodies. Grief and sympathy gradually turned to anger as people looked for someone or something to blame for the disaster. Some openly renounced their faith in a God who had seemingly failed to prevent such a terrible fate befalling innocent children.
 |
|
VOLUNTEER RESCUERS came from many parts of the United Kingdom to dig alongside local miners, some of whom were digging in hope of finding their own children.
|
But most of the anger was directed at the National Coal Board, which very quickly denied any responsibility for the disaster, even though it had been warned for many years that water penetration could cause the tips to slide. An official inquiry into the disaster later found that the NCB was wholly to blame and was ordered to pay compensation for loss and personal injuries.
Yet the NCB and the Labour Government still refused to accept full financial responsibility for the disaster and callously forced the Aberfan Disaster Fund to contribute £150,000 towards removing the remaining tips above the village. This was eventually repaid in 1997 at the instigation of Ron Davies, the then Secretary of State for Wales.
The disaster did eventually speed up the clearance of coal tips and mining infrastructure from the South Wales mining valleys, turning villages like Aberfan back into pleasant neighbourhoods in green valleys.
In a telling coincidence, a few days before the Aberfan anniversary a BBC News series on the Welsh economy announced that the last deep coal mine in South Wales, the privately-owned Tower Colliery in Hirwaun near Aberdare, would close within the year.
For the parents nothing could ever compensate for the loss of their children. Today, a memorial garden, lovingly tended by members of the community, sits on the site where Pantglas School once stood.
 |
|
A MASS FUNERAL was held on October 28, one week after the disaster. Some 3,000 people gathered in the cemetery above the town. Many wept openly as the children's coffins were lowered into the ground
|
The saddest place is the hillside cemetery, where the graves of so many children brings tears to the eyes of the most hardened visitor. The graves are joined together, each containing a last message from parents to a child, and all bearing that horrendous date, October 21, 1966.
A public memorial service, conducted by Father Michael St.Clair, was held on October 19 at St. Mary's Church, Merthyr Tydfil, a few miles up the road from the scene of the disaster. On the anniversary of the tragedy, Welsh Secretary Peter Hain and First Minister Rhodri Morgan joined relatives and survivors in prayers as wreaths were laid in the cemetery.
At the public memorial service, Rhodri Morgan said: "This was the 1960s. Wales still had 100,000 miners and coal was king. Coal was so important that we all accepted - until Aberfan - that there was a price to pay and we were all prepared to pay it. What we never foresaw was that coal could take the lives of our children. That was new, and terrible."
 |
|
TODAY THE TIPS have gone and Merthyr colliery has closed. About half the victims of the disaster were buried in the town's cemetery.
|
|
