Craig-y-nos Castle

Iris Jones - 1938-1942-Glass Conservatory

2011-07-11T14:27:00.005+01:00

Today it sounds positively medieval that a child could be "put away" for six years for a disease they never had and for two of those years to be strapped to a metal frame.

Yet that is what happened to Iris Jones. Her husband David rang to tell me a little of her story and he did so without anger or bitterness, simply to say "that was the way it was in those days."

For Iris, now 79 year of age and living in Cimla, Neath was admitted to the Glass Conservatory in Craig-y-nos, the ward for babies and small children, at seven years of age in 1938.

She was to remain there for four years. She does not recall it as being a sad time." I was only a child."

Her memories are of being wheeled out on to the veranda for the "fresh air" treatment and of singing in the Adelina Patti theatre. These were happy memories for her.

She was transferred to Kensington hospital, St Brides and put into a metal frame for two years only later to be discharged when they decided she did not have TB after all.

She recalls having to learn to walk again.

Early etching of Craig-y-nos castle

2011-07-08T22:35:00.008+01:00

" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5627100629753277218" />
( courtesy Phil Lewis)

The announcement that Craig-y-nos Castle is on the market again has caused me to re-visit my archive of 1,200 photographs sent in during research for the book "The Children of Craig-y-nos".

Only about 200 of those photographs made it into print so I have decided to publish more of them on this blog.

Here is one sent in by Phil Lewis from Gerrads Cross, Buckinghamshire whose mother, Sister Margaret Philips, was one of the first nurses to be appointed in the early 1920's.

Craig-y-nos Castle for sale

2011-07-07T10:56:00.002+01:00

Yet again Craig-y-nos Castle is about to change hands. It is on the market for £1.5million. The present owner is reputed to have bought it some ten years or more ago for £half a million. He has spent an enormous sum restoring it though it still has some way to go. The big problem I understand is the cost of the roof repairs on the main building. This is where the children's wards were and as a result they are virtually untouched from the days when it was first a children's TB hospital then a geriatric hospital. It was subsequently used as a base for ghost tours.

Now it looks as if it is all change again....

Margaret Morth - New Zealand

2011-05-16T17:05:00.002+01:00

I have had a query from New Zealand from a descendant of Margaret Morth who died in Craig-y-nos in 1937 asking for information.

Well, as you know there are no official records and all we have is anecdotal evidence and this for the 1930s is very sparse. However, on the off-chance that someone may have some knowledge I am quoting this email:

"I write from New Zealand in the hope that you may be able to help.
Today I received my children's Great Grandmothers death Certificate that states she died in the above when it was a Sanatorium.

Her name was - Margaret Elaine Morth
Death - 5 Dec 1937 in Adelina Patti Hospital.
I would like to know if possible when she was admitted and for how long she was a patient and/or any other information that is held that can be released to the public. Are there any photos of her available.?

I hope you can be of assistance and look for ward to hearing from you.

Yours truly

Christine Walton
6 Ashmore Court
Huntington
Hamilton 3210
New Zealand"

If you do have some information then Christine would love to hear from you.

Joan Powell and Nurse Glenys Davies

2011-04-28T23:19:00.002+01:00

I had a hunch that Nurse Glen might remember Joan Powell so I rang up Roy Harry and asked him if he would give her a call ( she is a very private person).
He agreed and within half an hour I get a call back to say yes of course she remembers Joan. She was one of the first to undergo an experimental operation on her spine by the surgeon Mr Rocking-Jones.

It worked and Joan was able to walk again.

Craig-y-nos and Joan Powell

2011-04-25T22:42:00.005+01:00

Children on the balcony ( from left to right) Ann in bed on the left with Joan on the right. The girl in the middle is unknown.

Easter Sunday morning and I check my email. Surely not?.....I blink and stare at the name in the header field: Joan Powell.

I read the email with increasing incredulity. It's from Dean, Joan's son. Did I know her? he is trying to find out something of his mother's early history in a Welsh TB hospital. She died 10 years ago. She never talked about her childhood.

Joan and I were in beds next to each other on the balcony. Joan was a plaster patient and I had to lie on my left side. We were the youngest and the most seriously ill.

We became close friends.

Dean explains:"
My mother died 10 years ago and my father last month but whilst going through some papers I found a postcard from Craig-y-nos.

I mum never said anything about her time there but was she the girl in your photos? She was from just outside Neath.

.....She was born in November 1941so I do not know if that ties in with that girl.

The post card I have shows the hospital and the mountains behind. It is to her mum and aunt ivy at 5 grove lane, pennhiewtynol In Neath.

I know she did have a back operation and was in plaster.

The only photos I have are from when she was 19."

I assure him that it his his mother. He rings his brother, Simon, in Australia.

Within an hour an email comes winging in from half way around the world. n:

"I am the youngest child of Joan Powell (Oldham) and understand that you have been communicating with my brother, Dean.

My mothers life before she met my father has always been a closed book, although I do recall visiting the castle when I was young on the way to a holiday in Pembroke (we always went there despite living in Leicester). Having just seen the first photo of my mother as a child on the internet, it has opened a bit of a window. I was always afraid that my mothers childhood was filled with pain and sadness as she never talked about it (although she did mention that she had a friend called Ann). From the pictures, it looks like she had people around her and some degree of a childhood in a beautiful place.

Sadly, the effects of her childhood illness were a factor in her early passing but not before she had 40 years of happy married life and 2 sons who loved her very much. I do not know how mum was as a child, but as a mother, she was simply the best."

And a second email from Simon adds:

"I think that mum was affected a number of ways by her stay at the sanatorium. She was always very concerned with cleanliness and I know that this came from her being ill and I guess the environment she lived in. She obviously had a big operation and there was a scar running the length of her back (dad told me this and I could only see the bit at the top). Mum was tiny throughout her life and I guess little more than 5 foot tall (I am 6 foot 2 inches). Her loss of natural height caused her problems when her body began its normal shrinking process through age. I remember mum being emotional when we visited the castle. It was a beautiful sunny day and I remember mum saying that it used to belong to an opera singer (did it have a stage?).

When she left, I presume that she went to Leicester to be with her dad, Joseph. Joe had already remarried by this time (also to a lady called Joan) and produced a daughter (Glenys). Glen is still living near to Leicester and, as she has gotten older, is the spitting image."

I ring Dean. He wants to know what I can remember about Joan. I tell him Joan and I were best friends, that she helped me settle for the long haul - four years- in Craig-y-nos, that she went on to have a major operation on her back with a long and difficult recovery time and our ways parted because she was in a different section of Ward 2.

Joan gets a monthly hair wash.

It is just possible that Nurse Glenys Davies will remember Joan and I have promised Dean to contact her.

It makes me sad to think that Joan never talked about her experiences as a child but as I explained to Dean this was the case with the majority of us for it was such a strange world that we lived in, a cross between a boarding school, orphanage and prison for we were incarcerated in a remote Welsh castle for years on end with no contact with the outside world apart from visitors once a month.
How could anyone who had not been through that experience understand what we went through? and would they have been interested anyway ? I doubt it because it would have been so foreign to anything that they would ever have even read about.
So better to say nothing.
Also there was the taboo of TB, the most feared disease in Wales that you only spoke about in hushed whispers as if even talking about it might inflict the white plague on your family.

So I can understand Joan not wanting to talk about her Craig-y-nos experience.

BBC- dumbing down daytime TV?

2011-04-03T21:26:00.003+01:00

Was the story of TB accurately portrayed in the BBC 1 TV programme A Hundred Years of Us?

Dr Carole Reeves, my co-author on the book" The Children of Craig-y-nos" and a medical historian with the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine UCL voices her concern.

A Hundred Years of Us
Broadcast on BBC 1, 22 March 2011, 9.15 am

Dr Reeves writes:
"This 45-minute programme, produced by Twenty Twenty Television for BBC1 to coincide with the census, is described as showing how Britain has changed in the past 100 years. A 10-minute feature on Craig-y-nos and tuberculosis right at the beginning of the programme ‘starred’ ex-patient, Barbara Pye, and ex-nurse, Valerie Brent. Both were excellent and it’s great that we were given the opportunity to contribute to this programme.

Both Ann and I spoke to the programme producers right at the beginning of the project and worked with them to give the historical background to tuberculosis and the Craig-y-nos story. We knew that the producers wanted to adopt a ‘positive’ slant on the issue of tuberculosis but weren’t prepared for the story to be whitewashed and spun to such an extent that it is simply untruthful. Viewers were told that tuberculosis in Britain has been almost totally eradicated due to the advent of the NHS in 1948 and the development of streptomycin. This was certainly not the information given to the programme producers but they chose to ignore it.

TB in Britain has NOT been eradicated. Indeed, it is on the increase. Since the mid-1980s, there has been a worldwide increase in TB of about 1 per cent. In Britain, the increase has been nearer to 2 per cent, and about 400 British people die of the infection every year. In 2009, 9040 cases of TB in Britain were diagnosed, up from 8621 in 2008. In some parts of London, the incidence of TB is equal to that in developing countries. Furthermore, there is a seriously scary increase of multi-drug resistant tuberculosis.

The producers said that the programme needed to be positive and fairly simply presented for daytime BBC1 television viewers. Who do they think these simpletons are that they can’t cope with a factual history of TB over the last century? Of course TB is not the scourge that it was in 1911 when 1 death in every 8 was a TB death but presenting it untruthfully as a ‘problem gone away’, does a disservice to the BBC and emphasises what many people regretfully realise is an escalating devaluation of its independence and integrity."

I share Dr Reeves concern with the dumbing down of the BBC in order to obtain good daytime television ratings especially within a programme that is of such potential historical significance.

Craig-y-nos on BBC morning television

2011-03-29T11:06:00.003+01:00

Well, did you see it? Our story was on telly. Well part of the story.....

This morning at 9.15am BBC TV launched new series on a Hundred Years of Britain - and we were there! I saw a photo of myself on the balcony with Miss White the teacher and so many of those that were in our book.

The star of this section, which lasted about ten minutes, was Barbara Pye one of the first people ever to be given stretomycin . She made a miracle cure and was home within 12 weeks.

Why Barbara? well this is how history is made: the researcher Nick Adey rang me and we talked at length about the subject. It was clear he was looking for a "happy angle". When I mentioned that there was an awful lot of dark stuff he said that it was daytime television and they didnt want to upset the viewers.

I mentioned Barbara Pye knowing she ticked all the tv boxes : glamorous, articulate, confident and with a good story and a happy ending.

And Barbara performed brilliantly sitting there between Michael Aspinall and Robert Winston in the BBC TV London studios.
I loved the way the BBC had reconstructed Dr Hubbard giving injections.

Valerie Brent also featured in the programme as one of only a couple of nurses still be alive who had worked at Craig-y-nos.

Nurse Glen is publicity shy or she would have been the ideal candidate having worked there for over 30 years.

BBC tv programme

2011-03-04T11:41:00.002Z

I understand from Valerie Brent, retired Craig-y-nos nurse, that the BBC TV will be launching their new series on 50 years of the National Health Service on Monday March 28 at 9 am ( that's right! daytime television) .
Have yet to confirm with the producer and will post nearer the time with a reminder.

Barbara Pye had to go to London to do her interview and it must have been a very long and tiring day for her especially as she had recently come out of hospital. However Barbara is a key figure in the piece on TB because she took part in the original drug trial of streptomycin and was one of the few women in Craig-y-nos to receive the drug in 1948.

Comments- Craig-y-nos

2011-01-05T13:21:00.002Z

Just checking out some of the comments and I have noticed that amongst all the spam I am getting stuff from young people who are using the blog as a resource for their assignments.
That's good.

BBC TV filming Craigynos

2010-12-08T16:58:00.003Z

Valerie Brent former nurse from the 1940s tells me she was interviewed last week for the new BBC series which looks at 50 years of the National Health Service.
Also interviewed was Barbara Pye ,one of the first people to receive streptomycin.
" It was snowing when we got to Craig-y-nos - just like old times."

I got the impression Valerie had a ball with the television people and they gave her a bouquet of flowers!

Valerie said:" I really surprised myself too! There were so many stories to tell."

Earlier in the week they interviewed Carole Reeves, Outreach Historian with the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine,UCL and co-author of The Children of Craig-y-.nos.

"The Children if Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, price £9.99, paperback is available from Amazon.co.uk

Comment
Enjoyed reading/following your page.Please keep it coming. Cheers!

Craig-y-nos and Sully

2010-12-02T17:05:00.005Z

Craig-y-nos and Sully – punishment regimes

Craig-y-nos Castle, former children's TB sanatorium and home of opera diva Adelina Patti

Sully hospital

Philip Cox recalls the different punishment regimes he experienced as a child patient in both Craig-y-nos and Sully during the 1950s.

“In Craig-y-nos they tied you to the bed. In Sully if you got out of bed and you weren’t supposed to, then they took your pyjamas trousers off you. I hated that!”

He went into Craig-y-nos in 1953 as a three and a half year old and later transferred to Sully for his lung operation.

He was amazed to discover the blogs the other day while trawling through the internet.

“ I couldn’t believe my eyes. Any minute I expected to come across a photo of myself!”

Now he has sent away for a copy of the book, “The Children of Craig-y-nos” from Amazon.

Despite his poor start in life he went on to become a rugby champion in school and won numerous medals for sport including throwing the javelin.

Philip lives in Pontypool with his family.

Changed times: to-day Craig-y-nos Castle is a hotel specialising in weddings and Sully has been converted into upmarket apartments.

BBC- "The Children of Craig-y-nos"

2010-11-15T16:37:00.013Z

Barbara as a young woman in Craig-y-nos in 1948. She was one of the first to take part in the trials for streptomycin.

Barbara Pye ( left) with her daughter-in-law

Dr Carole Reeves, medical historian with The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, co-author of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" arriving for book launch.

Valerie Brent, former nurse ( left) with Beryl Richards ( nee Rowlands) arriving at Craig-y-nos Castle.

The BBC are filming at Craig-y-nos this week as part of their new series on the Changing Face of Britain.

They will be focusing on Barbara Pye who was one of the first to take part in the trials for the life-saving drug streptomycin in 1948, Valerie Brent who worked as a nurse there for two years in the 1940s and Carole Reeves, medical historian with the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL ( and my co-author of "The Children of Craig-y-nos ") who will be providing the historical context.

The programme will be shown next Spring.

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, published in paperback by The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine , UCL, price £9.99p. It can be ordered from all good bookshops or online from Amazon.com

BBC 1 TV and Craig-y-nos

2010-11-07T11:45:00.002Z

BBC TV are doing a new series for next Spring on the Changing Face of Britian.

One of the themes is health and they will be featuring Craig-y-nos Castle when they cover TB and the introduction of the life-saving drugs.

Filming will take place shortly.

Book review- Dr Tony Jewell, Chief Medical Officer for Wales

2010-10-28T16:03:00.035+01:00

"The Children of Craig-y-nos"was short listed for the Open Book Awards 2010, organised by the Medical Journalists Association.
( from left to right) The team - designer Marc Riley, Carole Reeves, Ann Shaw and Malcolm Shaw who digitised all the images, at the presentation ceremony in the Wellcome Trust Library.

"The Children of Craig-y-nos"
by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves
published by the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL
price £9.99

Book review by Dr Tony Jewell, Chief Medical Officer for Wales

Craig-y-nos (Rock of the night) Castle, on the edge of the Brecon Beacons in South Wales, was the home of the world famous opera singer Adelina Patti.

After her death in 1919 it became a TB Sanatorium, mainly for children and young adults. This is an excellent book – a product of a community oral history.

Ann Shaw launched an internet blog in 2006 to collect stories from ex patients and staff. She spent four years as an inpatient between 9 to 14 years of age and was overwhelmed by the response to her blog.

She was able to collect 100 personal stories and over 1200 photographs within a year. This book is a product of this initiative between Ann and Carole Reeves an outreach historian from the Wellcome Trust.

It recounts the decades from the 1920s through to the 1950s through the eyes of the children, teenagers and staff and is richly illustrated with photographs. It is cleverly set in each historical period with reference to the developing
understanding of tuberculosis, its treatment and the public health impact.

Before the modern period of effective combined drug treatments for TB the prevailing wisdom was to isolate TB patients in sanatoria and expose them to “fresh mountain air”.

The stories recounted of these young and very ill children being made to sleep on the balcony, exposed to wind, cold and sometimes snow is hard to fathom from the comfort of the 21st century and with notions of the UN Rights of a child!

“The snow falls thick and fast, covering the bottom of the beds, then the whole bed and finally the lockers. We put our beds alongside the wall. This gives us some extra protection. Our beds are igloo-like, with bits of old tarpaulin tied with string, which is carefully hoarded for occasions like this”

“Friday morning: I am ill and have been given five big white tablets and told to keep quiet. I think I have a cold in the tummy. Snow covers half my bed and my slippers are soaking from paddling through the wet snow to get inside” ( Ann Shaw as a child on the balcony with Nurse Glenys Davies and again at the Patients Reunion )

Remember that some of these children were confined to the sanatorium from a very young age with very little continuing contact with their families, estranged by the institutional regime there but also the geographical isolation and logistical difficulty and cost to visit.

“I was admitted at nine months of age in 1927, so I grew up in the Glass Conservatory.
My mother used to visit me twice a year, not that I knew her anyway. The family was “on the parish” and that is all they were allowed.

They thought I had TB of the stomach. I was always on the veranda. We would stay there all night with a bit of tarpaulin over the cot. There was no schooling, I can’t remember drawing or writing on paper.

Twenty years ago, I was diagnosed with coeliac disease and needed only to be on a gluten free
diet. Instead I spent the first five years of my life in a TB sanatorium” (Winnie Gardiner (pictured above left ) as a child in the Glass Conservatory and (right) at the Patients Reunion in Craigynos Castle.)

These harrowing accounts included physical restraint such as tying young children to their cots and beds, physical, emotional and sexual abuse is all recorded in the extracts.

The other side to this book is its insight into tuberculosis as a major public health problem, the various surgical treatments culminating in the discovery of effective drug treatments such as with streptomycin. It also traces the journey of a health system from a TB sanatorium run by the King Edward VII Welsh National Memorial Association (WNMA) which was established in 1910 with a remit to prevent, treat and eradicate TB in Wales into an NHS hospital and eventual closure in 1986. Local Authorities had a role too as the 1921 Public Health (TB) Act made it obligatory for all County Borough Councils to provide treatment for people with TB. When the WNMA was disbanded in 1948, at the inception of the NHS, it funded 2600 beds, seventy doctors, 580 nurses and 830 domestic staff, a mobile x ray, research laboratory and a Chair of TB at the Welsh National School of Medicine in Cardiff. This book is a compelling read from its stories from patients, many of whom remain traumatised by the memories,their social situation and difficult family circumstances; by its insight into TB which remains a global scourge and it’s tracing the creation of the WNMA and development into the new NHS in the late 1940s. However it is the indomitable human spirit which shines through.

The Preface written by Clive Rowlands former Captain and Coach of Welsh Rugby:

Clive at home

“I was admitted as an eight year old, in 1947. That winter was the snowiest since 1814 and among the coldest on record, but our beds were wheeled out onto the balcony so that our lungs would benefit from the sharp, icy mountain air...Although I was one of five children, I don’t think I suffered as much as other youngsters because my sister, in her early twenties, was already in Craig-y-nos and I was allowed to see her every day. I also benefited from her weekly visitors because children’s visiting was normally only once a month. However I wasn’t aware that my sister was terminally ill and she was later sent home to die....My most abiding memory however is of receiving a rugby ball....and being punished for kicking it through a glass door. I was put in a straightjacket for a week.”

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" is available from Amazon Online or ordered from any good bookshop.

Death of Dulcie Oltersdorf

2010-10-12T19:05:00.005+01:00

I have just been informed of the death of Dulcie Oltersdorf who went into Craig-y-nos in 1948.

Dulcie Oltersdorf ( centre ) and friends in a rowing boat on the lake at Craig-y-nos. This was strictly against the sanatorium regime but the gardeners colluded with the young women.

Dulcie Oltersdorf (Lewis) – Blood tests and blunt needles

I was on bed rest at home for a year, waiting for a bed in Craig-y-nos. The night before going in I wanted to go to the local dance and my mother let me. She shouldn’t have, but I met my boyfriend that night, a German prisoner-of-war. He used to visit me in Craig-y-nos. I was admitted to the Annexe three days before my twenty-first birthday in 1948.

I had to lie flat on my back and do nothing. That was the treatment. Well, after three months I had an X-ray and they
said, ‘You will have to lie on your back for another three months, maybe six months.’ I was determined that I would get better and if that was the treatment then I would do it! Sister Outram was very strict.

We used to close the windows at night and she would come in first thing in the morning, fling them wide open and we would eat our breakfasts shivering with cold. It was for
our own good. She told my mother that a cure depended on the ability of the patient to settle down and do what they were told.

I was able to settle quickly. We had regular blood tests and we used to hate it when Dr Hubbard did them because she
always used blunt needles. Afterwards, our arms would be covered in bruises.

I was happy and comfortable at Craig-y-nos. It was a good hospital.
When I was discharged I married my boyfriend. We have been together now for fifty-eight years and have never had a cross word!

Extract from The Children of Craig-y-nos by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, paperback £9.99, available from Amazon online or Waterstones

Valerie Brent- 80th birthday

2010-10-11T10:04:00.000+01:00

(from left to right) Valerie Brent, former nurse at Craig-y-nos, Cynthia Mullan, director of Sleeping Giant oral history charity and Ann Shaw , former patient at the first patients reunion.

Valerie, who worked as a nurse in Craig-y-nos during the 1940s, rang to say that she celebrated her 80th birthday last Tuesday with a big party.

In fact she has a month of celebrations coming up culminating in a special dinner with her daughter and son-in-law at Celtic Manor hotel ( of Ryder Cup fame) when they celebrate their Pearl wedding and Valerie her 80th birthday.

Quite a party girl is our Val.

Mari Friend ( nee Jenkins) - sad news

2010-07-29T11:46:00.012+01:00

Girls on the balcony of Craig-y-nos Castle. Mari is in the middle of the back row and Ann ( Shaw nee Rumsey) is on the far right.

Many of you will remember Mari Friend ( nee Jenkins) so it was with great sadness that I received this email from her son Chris:

Hi Ann ,
I regret to inform you that my mum, Mari Friend, passed away last Sunday (July 25th). As you know she was suffering from Bronchiolitis and Rheumatoid Arthritis for many years and had fought these two conditions bravely.

Unfortunately in the last few months she was diagnosed with lymphoma and her chest were not able to stand any treatment.

The last two weeks saw a rapid deterioration especially the last three days.
She died peacefully on a hospital ward where she was well known and treated as family.
I'm sorry to pass on this news with an e-mail but we're unable to find a number for you.
Chris"

And 50 years later.... Ann and Mari on the balcony of Ann's home Bridge of Allan, Scotland overlooking the mountains to the north..

Mari and I shared some time together in Craig-y-nos in the early 1950’s and even after she left we kept in contact for a number of years. She came on holiday to our farm Ty-Llangenny , outside Crickhowell and I stayed in Ynysygwas, Cwmavon.
Later we shared the same hostel accommodation, Bourne and Hollingsworth in Gower St where Mari worked as a sales assistant, and I had a job as a secretary to a publishing house in Russell Square.

After that our paths separated: I went off to work in Switzerland and Iceland and Mari got married.
We met up again a few years ago on the Craig-y-nos project following a request I put in the local paper “ The South Wales Evening Post” asking for the “ lost children of Craig-y-nos”.
Mari came forward and that is when we discovered that Mari had this amazing collection of photographs from her time and her sister’s time in Craig-y-nos .

This collection formed a substantial part of our book “The Children of Craig-y-nos” which I co-authored with Dr Carole Reeves, Outreach Historian with The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine.
I am deeply grateful to Mari for her contribution. She was always such a cheerful character both as a child and in her later years even though suffering from poor health.

Mari will be sadly missed.

Petition to save Wellcome Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL

2010-05-19T23:09:00.003+01:00

Carole Reeves, my co-author on "The Children of Craig-y-nos" project without whom there would not have been a printed book now has a new battle on her hands: to save her Department.

Incredible though it seems they are planning to close the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, University College London, where Carol is the Outreach Historian.

She has launched a blog and campaign to save it: friendsofwtchom.blogspot.com/

And this is the link to the online petition. Please help her and sign.

www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/petition-sign.cgi?WTCHOMs

Short list- Wellcome library

2010-05-10T14:50:00.004+01:00

(Photo: Dan Tsantilis)

Here's a photo of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" team short listed for book award- medical journalist of the year, general category,-at the presentation ceremony in the Wellcome Library at the Wellcome Trust.

They are ( from left to right) book designer Marc Riley, co-authors Dr Carole Reeves, Outreach Historian, and Ann Shaw with Malcolm Shaw who digitised and restored all the photos used in the book.

Death of David Perrott

2010-05-05T22:39:00.005+01:00

It is with great sadness I have learnt of the death of David Perrott.
David was a "plaster bed"patient for two years in 1950. He lived out on the balcony and during the summer he was given goggles to protect his eyes and in the winter he had vaseline rubbed on his face for he lived out on the balcony all year round, even in sub-zero temperatures. In addition he was given ear muffs to wear.

He was told that he would never have children and never be able to work. He did both.

David lived in Abercrave, only a few miles from Craig-y-nos Castle.

His son, Ryan Perrott wrote the following comment after the story first appeared on this blog, 14 February 2007.

"This is my father, looking as happy as ever! i'm glad he did have a child and was able to work,as we have had an amazing journey so far and wish it to continue on and on and on!!he is an amazing man,who is a blessing to me and my family!!

Footnote: Ryan was the first person I met when I began this project in January 2007 with a visit to Craig-y-nos Castle. The South Wales Evening Post carried a small feature on my search for the "lost childen of Craig-y-nos" and Ryan was the first person I interviewed on that Saturday afternoon in January sitting in the bar of Craig-y-nos Castle, a world away from the harsh hostile sanatorium regime we both remembered as children.

I shall always remember him, how he pulled out of his wallet this carefully folded photograph of his father, barely a square inch in diameter. He kept it with him all his life because he wanted to tell people of the remarkable story of his father's survival ...

Medical Journalist award- London

2010-04-30T12:17:00.003+01:00

Carole and Ann taken in Carole's office at the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of medicine, UCL

Well, we didn't win an award for the "Children of Craig-y-nos" but, along with four other runners-up, we received a certificate
commending us "for excellence in communicating medical and health information in a book for the lay reader".

The prize was awarded to "Medic: saving lives - from Dunkirk to Afghanistan by John Nichol and tony Rennell - a very worthy winner.

Children of Craig-y-nos - short list

2010-04-24T11:57:00.003+01:00

“ A powerful story told in words and pictures assembled from first-hand accounts…reveals shocking details of children’s lives in a Welsh TB hospital.”

That’s what the judges say about “Children of Craig-y-nos”.

Well, I guess I never thought of it in that light. To me who spent four years in Craig-y-nos as a child it seemed normal. I didn’t know anything else.

It is only now with a distance of more than 50 years I realise in writing this book, along with Carole Reeves, that it was far from normal.

There are five books short-listed for the Open Book Award and the winner will be announced on Tuesday evening at a special presentation to be held at the Wellcome Foundation.

The others on the shortlist ( General readership, category) include “Manufacturing Depression, the secret history of a modern disease” by Gary Greenberg, “An Infinity of things: how Sir Henry Wellcome collected the world” by Frances Larson and “Medic: saving lives – from Dunkirk to Afghanistan” by John Nichol and Tony Rennell.

So you see the field is very strong…the miracle is that we have even got as far as the short-list!

I will be travelling by train from Scotland to London tomorrow…

"Children of Craig-y-nos" short list

2010-04-21T13:52:00.001+01:00

The short list is out. We are one of five in our category. It looks very strong....fingers crossed.

Short-listed - book award

2010-03-31T17:15:00.003+01:00

Just heard that our book, "The Children of Craig-y-nos" has been shortlisted for the annual medical journalists book award.
We will know on April 27th at a reception in London if it has been successful.

Still, I am more than pleased to get on the short-list.

Talk on Craig-y-nos

2010-03-25T11:49:00.002Z

Dr Carole Reeves of The Wellcome Trust Centre for the Hisotry of Medicine, UCL tells me that her talk yesterday reduced some people to tears!
And she has been asked to do one again at the Royal Free Hospital to the infectious diseases group.

She says: "The hospital sees lots of patients with TB, which as you may know, is a serious problem now in London."

And we all think this is a disease of the past.

World TB Day -"The Children of Craig-y-nos"

2010-03-24T11:33:00.002Z

Dr Carole Reeves, my co-author of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" will be talking this afternoon at a seminar on World TB Day organised by University College of London.
Carole, Outreach Historian with The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine was instrumental in helping to get the book written and published, the culmination of a two year community based project.

New Zealand - and Craig-y-nos

2010-03-21T16:18:00.003Z

Caroline Boyce , ex child patient and neighbour of mine in Scotland, wrote an article in the Oldie magazine about her childhood experiences in Craig-y-nos and she has just received the following email from Joyce Fleming in New Zealand whose late husband was a patient there in the 1930's.

Joyce says:

"I believe this was the same place in which my late husband spent his childhood from the age of 5 to 12 because of TB hip problems, around 1930-37".

If you were there, or had a relative who was there and would like to contact Joyce then I am sure she would love to hear from you.
Her email addredss is: joycef@xtra.co.nz

Scion House exhibition - Stirling

2010-03-16T23:19:00.004Z

(from left to right) Mary, Ann and Caroline on the balcony of Craig-y-nos Castle

I was surprised at the public interest in the six photos I showed from the "Children of Craig-y-nos" project in my recent exhibition in Scion House- Stirling University Innovation Park. I only put them in as an after thought ( Malcolm's suggestion). I didnt think anybody would be interested because the work is so deeply rooted in Wales and Welsh medical history.

But I was wrong. Everyone I spoke to who looked at them were able to tell me of their own personal stories , dark tales from the past where they had relatives who had this disease that was not spoken about.

"Oldie" magazine- Caroline Boyce ( nee Havard)

2010-01-19T17:14:00.005Z

This is a copy of Caroline's article in this month's "Oldie" magazine:

Caroline Boyce- Oldie magazine

2010-01-18T18:30:00.012Z

(From left to right) Mary , Ann ( in bed) and Caroline on the balcony of Craig-y-nos Castle.

Caroline Boyce ( nee Havard) has her story in this month's
"Oldie" magazine" (Go to the link in the side panel on "Whats in.." the magazine this month.)

She tells me it gave her quite a turn when she picked up the magazine and read it in print.

Well it came as something of a shock to me too when I bought a copy today from WH Smith and opened it to find a photo of Mary, Caroline and myself in Craig-y-nos.

It is as if our history has been finally validated now its out in the common domain.

Caroline has written an excellent account which I shall put up on the blog ( once I have figured out how to put it into the correct file format for the web)

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves ( price £9.99) published by The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL.

Book sales- "Children of Craig-y-nos"

2010-01-16T18:51:00.008Z

Many folk are asking me how the sales of the book are going.

Well, over 800 copies of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" have been printed.

But there's a problem - neither Borders in Swansea ( yes I know they have now gone defunct but they were still in business when they ordered the books) nor the Welsh Book Council ( naughty! naughty!) have paid a penny.

They owe the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL several hundred pounds.

Dr Carole Reeves tells me she has written to them repeatedly and got no response.

She says Borders was particularly devious.
Clair Robinson, their Sales & Marketing Supervisor of Borders Books, Swansea rang Dr Reeves to say t they'd had 'hundreds of requests' for the book and could she send a batch urgently.

She claimed it would take too long to go through the normal wholesaler channels and she didn't want to disappoint her customers in Swansea.

So books were sent off to Swansea and that is the last that Carole heard from them.

Says Carole:" Despite follow-up e.mails, invoices and telephone calls from our Finance Officer, this amount is still outstanding. Despicable really.

Same goes for the Welsh Book Council. They have never even bothered to acknowledge her correspondence even after she sent them one free book and 20 as requested.

Same goes for Welsh Books Council. Daffyd Jones is the contact there.
" I was promised a contract to supply the Welsh Books Council, which I have never received despite follow-up letters and a phone call from you. They have had one free viewing copy and 20 books, " says Carole.

The book is on their website but I have received no reimbursement for sales. I have asked them to return all unsold books plus money from sales / or send a contact. Nothing. Not even an acknowledgement of my correspondence," says Carole.

I have rung the Welsh Book Council myself on several occasions to try and hurry things along and I have been assured by Daffyd Jones that the matter was in hand.

What I would like to know is :who funds the Welsh Book Council? isn't it time somebody took a close look at this organisation?

I am passing this on to the Western Mail and Evening Post in the hope that they might be able to "name and shame" them into paying up.

If you want to buy a copy of the "The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves (price £9.99) you can do so through Waterstones or online: Amazon.co.uk

Book launch photos- late photos from last May

2010-01-08T19:14:00.023Z

Cynthia Mullan of the Sleeping Giant Foundation, introducing the launch of the book" The Children of Craig-y-nos".
This locally based oral history charity provided invaluable support and help throughout the project.

Clive Rowlands, former Welsh rugby star and ex child patient at Craig-y-nos, officially opening "The Children of Craig-y-nos" book launch in the newly refurbished Glass Conservatory of Craig-y-nos Castle.

Most of the people attending the book launch were ex child patients.

Co-authors of the book Ann Shaw ( left) and Dr Carole Reeves, Outreach Historian with The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, signing copies.

Ann Shaw ( nee Rumsey) left and Caroline Boyce (nee Havard) in Scotland.

Photos supplied by Caroline Boyce.

Caroline was herself a patient in 1949-50 and this was her first return visit to Craig-y-nos. She became a teacher and on retirement moved to Scotland with her husband, Paul, in order to be near their family.
She lives about 15 miles from Ann Shaw though they only discovered they were neighbours as a result of this project.

Copies of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves,published by The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, price £9.99 are available from all good bookshops or online from Amazon.co.uk.

Sue Wilson, Sydney Australia

2009-12-22T15:20:00.002Z

This has just appeared on the BBC Mid-Wales web-site:

"Very interesting project- I recently watched a programme on ABC tv about a farm set up in Molong in Australia for children brought out from the UK to have the chance of a better life in Australia after WW11. The abuses there were kept secret for so long, but for many a chance at healing the memories has begun.
Fri Dec 4 11:26:37 2009 "

Ivy Stokes - St Brides

2009-12-21T13:02:00.001Z

I pick up the phone in Scotland. It's a call from Newport in South Wales and a lilting Welsh voice asks about St Brides.

It's Ivy Stokes, searching for her missing Welsh history, time spent as a child in this TB sanatorium on the Pembrokeshire coast.

Did I know of anyone there? She would love to be able to talk to someone who had shared her experiences.

Ivy was a patient Kensington hospital 1941-45 age 10 years.

I give her David Pearce's phone number . He runs a blog for ex-patients.

I do not normally carry stories about other sanatoriums but Ivy's account is so similar to the Craig-y-nos experience that I thought it worth telling it here although I am sure David will be running it on his blog too.

Ivy Stokes asked her granddaughter if she would help her search on the internet for Kensington Hospital.
“ I would love to meet someone who was there the same time as me,” says Ivy, age 77 from Newport.

“I was there as a 10 years old from 1941 for three and a half years. After I left my mother wouldn’t let me keep in contact with any of the other children. TB was all “ hush hush “ in those days and she was afraid of bringing it back into the house again.”

Now suffering form osteoporosis and arthritis she finds herself thinking about those early days as a child in plaster out on the balcony in Kensington hospital.

“I remember shivering from cold and how we used to pray for it to rain so that we would be wheeled back indoors again.”

She also remembers being strapped to the bed.
“ It was for my own good. It was to make me keep still”.

She remembers being in the Girl Guides, and the day World War 2 ended.
“There was a party. Everyone kept saying” the war has ended the war has ended.”

On returning home at 13 half years of age she went back to school for six months.

“ Nobody talked about TB then. It was all “ hush hush”. But it leaves a mark on you as a patient. I keep myself to myself. I am quiet. I am not a good mixer.

“I got a job in a factory sewing shirts. Then I got married and had two children. Now I have six grandchildren.”

If you were in Kensington in the early 1940s then Ivy would love to hear from you.

Her phone number is: 01633 768651

Reunion - in dancing class!

2009-12-15T21:38:00.003Z

(From left to right) Doug and Joyce Herbert, Roy Harry and Val Filby.

Two boys who were in Craig-y-nos during the war met up again - in a dancing class in Cwmavon!!

Roy Harry says:
"We recently joined a new dancing class in our village. There were no familiar faces, until Doug & Joyce Herbert walked in.

We couldn't place them immediately but then remembered we had met them at the first Craig y Nos reunion.

If we hadn't met at the reunion over two years ago in Craig-y-nos we would not have realised that we were together in ward 1
during the war! "

Roy Harry gives a very moving account of how as a child of three he had a gastric lavage and Doug Herbert tells how he was force-fed cabbage until he was sick.

Both stories are in the book:"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, price £9.99. available from all good bookshops and online from Amazon.co.uk

Dr Frank Wells-First Medical Superintendent at Craig-y-nos

2009-12-06T18:18:00.001Z

Chris Willey, from Gloucestershire, grandson of Dr Frank Wells the first medical superintendent at Craig-y-nos, discovered our web-site and contacted me to see if we have any information on his maternal grandfather.

I could only refer him to our book "The Children of Craig-y-nos" and the research carried out by Carole Reeves.

She discovered that Dr Wells was appointed in 1921 but left in 1926 due to illness to be replaced by two young Scottish women doctors, Dr Lizzie Robertson Clark and her assistant Dr Sarah Walker.

He qualified at St Mary's hospital, London, in 1911.

Chris says:" I never knew him as he died before I was born but my mother used to play at the castle as a child (she was born in 1915 so I assume it would have been in the early twenties) especially in the theatre where the opera singer Adelina Patti sung."

Chris added in another email:

"About twenty five - thirty years ago I took my mother (who died in 2001) down to Craig-y-nos. We were very fortunate that when we were there a person who worked there struck up a conversation with my mother, the end result being that he showed us all round the place. Obviously quite a lot had changed but she recognised a lot. Her biggest thrill was to be shown around the theatre where she used to play as a child.

Frank Wells was a medical missionary in Southern India and shortly after he married he and his wife went out to India. My mother was actually born there (in 1915) and at the age of 5 the family returned to England for my mother's education. I believe Craig-y-nos was his first UK appointment on his return.

This visit to the Castle was, I believe the only time she went back there since her childhood but she used to speak about her time there with very fond memories - she adored her father, her relationship with her mother was of a much more "formal" nature."

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, published by The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, price £9.99p

Norma ( nee Bryant) Neads - 1945

2009-11-29T16:37:00.001Z

I have just had an email from Simon Neads whose mother, Norma (nee Bryant) was in Craig-y-nos in 1945 for seven months. She was five years of age.

He says:
"My mother was only allowed one visit a month from my grandparents.
My mother had her 5th Birthday at Craig-y-nos. My mother remembers her preacher visiting from Cwmaman (her village). Her bed was placed on the verander with a sun hat and only underwear to have all the fresh air.

My mother also remembers snow on her bed. The staff used to plait her hair with calica. My mother had her tonsils out in hospital, she remembers the bathroom and the big table in the middle of the ward. My mother recently visited on her 70th birthday, and was taken around and saw the ward.
It was very emotional for her."

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves is available from Waterstones or online from Amazon.co.uk

Robert Lindsay, actor- TB as a child

2009-11-21T15:18:00.005Z

The taboo of silence that used to surround TB crops up in unexpected quarters.

On today’s BBC Radio 4’s Saturday Morning Live programme actor Robert Lindsay says he didn’t know until he was 42 that he had TB as a child.

It was a doctor who looked at his chest x-ray and told him there was a TB scar on his lung.

He asked his father who confirmed it (his mother was already dead.

He said: “It was a disease of the poor, something that was hidden away. My parents never talked about it.”

Yet as a 7 year old he remembers that he spent three months in a sanatorium.

As an actor he “ dumped his background” along with his Derbyshire accent.

But loosing a chunk of his childhood did have consequences. It made him isolated; he likes being on his own.

Well, all those of us who went through the “sanatorium experience” know exactly how he feels.

Book "The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves

Dr John Crofton- leading TB specialist

2009-11-21T10:52:00.008Z

Dr John Crofton, the Edinburgh doctor who perfected the triple-drug regime for TB has just died aged 97 in Edinburgh.

He was given a copy of “The Children of Craig-y-nos” a few months ago by my former colleague Chris Holme , Health correspondent on “The Herald” who knew him personally and had written about his work for many years.

Chris is now Communications manager for the NHS in Scotland.
He hand delivered the book to Dr Crofton one afternoon and he says there was a “scrabble between Dr Crofton and his wife as to who would be the first to read it.”

Raymond O'Connor- his story-( final )

2009-11-18T10:25:00.011Z

Bertha O'Connor with her two children Eileen and Raymond, 1942.

Missing piece of the puzzle
Bertha was to die a few years later in Craig-y-nos where both Raymond and his sister were patients. He remembers living in a "big glass building" but only when he received a copy of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" did he realise that it was the same place his mother had ended her life in.
Following her death he was sent to relatives in Liverpool.

Raymond celebrating his 71st birthday

sister Eileen

Raymond continues the final part of his story: Act of kindness
Many months passed before my sister Eileen joined me and I remember it was Christmas time. The war was still on and the food I was given was next to nothing as I was always hungry, mostly bread. The only person who showed any kindness was the next-door neighbour Mrs. Quinn who ran a grocers shop, she gave each child an apple, orange and a stocking with chocolates.

Thrown scraps of food
I must not forget the workmen who worked at Camellaird shipyard who on their way home. They used to give me their leftover sandwiches, which I shared with my sister and stepsisters. This was the pattern of life to follow for my sister Eileen and myself for our main source of food was going through the bins.

Moving house
The next thing that happened was my father was demobbed as he came home and told us we were moving into a new house, 71 St.Paul's Road next door to William's paper shop and opposite Cissy Walker's. Shortly after this, Christina my half sister was born. She was not to know then but she had a
great deal of misfortune ahead of her. She was neither a Walker nor an O'Connor and totally deprived of love all her life yet she admired and worshipped me as her big brother.
This I found out at Clatterbridge hospital, Cheshire shortly before she died of cancer at the age of 50.

Beatings doubled
My father started work at the shipyard, the only thing that altered for Eileen and myself was we got 2 beatings instead of one because after Kitty Walker had told him what we had or not done we got another hiding off him.
It was round about this time that I had a strange experience, during the night I was disturbed by a lady who stood at the end of my bed beckoning to me and when she left the room I ran down the stairs, woke my fathe and told him of the incident. As you can imagine this was not a wise thing to do, he dismissed me and told me to go to bed and not to be so stupid. I slept on the staircase for the rest of the night, as I was frightened.

Traumatised and stammering
The food situation never improved as we never ever had breakfast, went to school hungry and had only bread
when we got back. Things improved when we were given supplemented food and free milk at school. I was so traumatised, that I began to stammer and was sent to a school in Well Lane for special therapy after school
hours and was still under observation of Doctor Foster a specialist in TB, his surgery was in Hamilton Square,
Birkenhead. I had to go every 6 months for a check up and I wondered why my sister never went.

Sent to convalescence
It was during one of these visits that the doctor found it necessary to send me to convalescence in Southport for three months. When I was about 11 years old the schoolteacher called Mrs. Allroyd at Ionic School took pity on me and gave me a pair of leather boots, which were studded on the heel, and toe and I shall never forget this act of kindness.

Flea infested home
What does puzzle me is why nobody ever took any action against the conditions and the cruelty that prevailed in this house that we lived in. The beds, bedding and the walls of the house were infested with fleas, we were bitten from top to bottom and we were covered with scars from the belt, shoe and bamboo cane beatings. Kitty Walker used the steel brush to beat Eileen over her head whilst she brushed her hair.

Childhood games
It was not all gloom and doom. Like all children you always find time to play and enjoy yourself, as adversity is not a thing you think about. The bombed houses became a playground a place for hiding and full of adventure as I had a vivid imagination. The local pub was a focal point for all the characters that lived in the district. At the weekend it was a hive of activity and as children we used to watch the grownups singing and dancing in the parlour. There was a passageway between the parlour and the snug where all the old ladies gathered to gossip and men played darts and stood by the bar drinking. We used to do pretend boxing outside the pub as the drunks came out and threw pennies at us in the middle of the road as there were no cars about in them days. In the weekdays it was quiet except for the snug where the old ladies had their heads together gossiping.

Earned pocket money running to bookies
There was Cissy Walker head of the pack with Mrs.Shields, Mrs.Laverne, Mrs.Hughes and a few others who were my source of income as I was running messages for them by placing bets at the illegal bookies and collecting any winnings. When they did win their bets, they gave me some extra money.

Suits to pawnshop on Monday …back on Friday
They also sent me to the pawnshop, one was on St.Paul's Road and the other was on Old Chester Road near Green Lane. I took bundles of bedding and their husbands suits and shoes on a Monday and fetched them back out on Friday morning so their husbands could use them at the weekend. I don't think the men were aware of this.

The prize panda that came to life
It was near Christmas time they had raffles and the prizes were hampers of food. One of the times the prize was a great big Panda and guess who won it, 'KITTY WALKER’ She was not going to to give it to any of the children and they discussed re-raffling it to make money for themselves. So on the following Saturday while they were at the pub I opened the panda and took all the filling out, asked my sister Eileen to get in and stitched it up. You can imagine the shock on Kitty
Walker and my dad's face when they returned home drunk to see the panda running around, I knew what to expect so I ran away when I heard them say 'what has he done this time’.

Running away from home
All the time I lived with this family, I tried running away at every opportunity, as I wanted to go back to my family in Wales. I took a plan of action when I found out that two boys who broke into a corner shop were sent to work on a farm in Wales as punishment. They told me tales of how they looked after animals on the farm, so at every opportunity I used to break into shops, play truant in the hope of being arrested and sent to Wales.

Confessed to crimes that I didn’t do in hope of being sent away
Finally, on one of my excursions I stole my fathers cycle and cycled through Chester to Wales. I got as far as Conway Castle before the police who wished to know where I was going arrested me. I was taken back to Well Lane police station where I was interrogated by the CID, I told them everything I had done and when they asked me to look at the book which contained all the crimes, committed in that area, I admitted to most of them hoping they would send me away even though I had not
done them.

Sent to approved school
The consequence of this action was that I ended up in court and sentenced to approved
school. Before they sent me away the social worker visited me in my cell and said that I had a choice as they could intervene on my behalf if I wished. They gave a choice, did I want to go away or go home to which I
replied 'I want to go away' as this was my plan all the time, to get away from the house of horrors.
I was sent to St.Thomas Moores in Southport.

First job as coffin maker
I was released at the age of 15 and returned to 71 St.Paul's Road, Rockferry but things had not changed. I was given my first job by the social worker as a coffin maker and when I received my wages at the end of the week, I was told by my father to hand over the wages to Kitty Walker.

The meal situation was no different as Kitty Walker was playing the black market with the ration coupons as she had always done and when I finished work and sat down in the chair I was told, why don't you go out, you are always under my feet and when I did go out it was always, 'where have you been, don’t you know what time to come in'.

Leave home
Finally we had a bust up as I said, 'how can I go out if you take all my wages?”
Kitty Walker said, 'you have to pay for all your food and all the family allowance I lost while you were at the approved school'. I told her I was leaving and never coming back. She told me to tell my father when he came home which I did and he said, 'you've made your bed, now lie in it, as it is a big world out there and you will
be sorry'.

The happiest day of my life is when I left 71 St.Paul's Road never to return.”

Raymond is married with three children and two grandchildren.

He lives with his wife in Gainsborough with their eldest son and is kept busy doing maintenance, decoration and repair work for all his family.

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves available from Waterstones or online from Amazon.co.uk

Raymond O'Connor- his story-( contin)

2009-11-17T12:30:00.006Z

Raymond with his father Chris O'Connor and mother Bertha taken in 1939.

After leaving Craig-y-nos, where his mother died, his ordeal was about to begin for he was sent to relatives in Liverpool.
Raymond's story is so heart-rendering that I am running it in full. It's like a Welsh version of "Angela's Ashes".
This is the second part:

"The next memory I have is that someone went to a great expense to kit me out in brand new clothes, grey jacket and trousers, collar and tie, a peak cap, socks that came up to my knees with a pattern on the top, brand new shoes and mackintosh. I can remember travelling to the railway station in a horse and cart and the gentleman with a top hat handed me over to the porter along with a letter of instructions of my destination. I can remember changing stations at Crewe and being put on another train to Chester.

On my journey from Crewe to Chester I recollect a lady telling me to take off my mackintosh as it was very warm in the coach. I remember having to wait in Chester in the porter's room where they gave me a big mug of tea and biscuits. After some time I was put on a train to Rockferry, Birkenhead.

I was met by a man and a woman there who took me to a house in St.Paul's Road, Rockferry.

Craig-y-nos Castle

If anybody thought of 'Craig-y-nos' as a bad place to live in, what was about to take place is like a horror movie.

I was introduced to my new family as they put it, the lady who picked me up at the railway station, told me that she was my new mother and the place where I was to live was a one room flat and the 2 girls that were there were my sisters. Catherine who was the eldest and Beryl. I was told to put my bags down and come to meet the new family .

We walked up the street for 300 yards all the houses we passed were derelict and bombed, to a row of houses that were three storeys high with a cellar.

Opposite there was a pub called The Railway Hotel. We went into the first house that we came to, down the steps into a cellar.
Inside, was a crinkly old man in the corner and his wife sat opposite and about 5 children of different ages.

The mother and father of my new mother were introduced to me as Cissy and Hughie Walker. The horror was about to begin as I was told to take off all my new clothes and to put on the rags that they gave me.

The shoes had holes in the soles with piece of cardboard to keep out the water. ' These new clothes will be kept for Sunday only' were the harsh words of Kitty Walker, needless to say, I never saw them ever again.

My reaction was one of horror as I ran out of the house down the street straight across the main road where I was brought to a final halt by being covered with black mud and water as I had reached the muddy shores of Rockferry muddy beach.

I was retrieved by two of Kitty Walker's brothers Sammy and Gerald who dragged me back to the big house, stood me in the backyard and hosed me down with cold water.

What an introduction to my new family on the first day!

(to be continued)

Raymond O'Connor- Lincolnshire

2009-11-12T15:05:00.040Z

Raymond's 71st birthday party

This is Raymond O'Connor personal account of how TB affected his life.

He decided to write his story after a relative sent him a copy of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" as a 71st birthday present.

Not only did it trigger off many childhood memories but it provided the answers to questions he had been asking all his life.

Today he is married with three children and lives in Gainsborough.
He says:" I am kept quite busy doing the maintenance, decoration and repair for all my children.

My story is about Tuberculosis and how it took control and shaped the destiny of my family.

It all started with the death of my grandmother Margaret Ann Davies formerly Williams. Her father was a coachman who had the public house called the 'Bull's Head' in Brecon.

It was at the time of the farmers market where she met Dan Isaac Davies whom she later married. This was normal practice at the time, for all the local farmers to visit Brecon to sell their wares. Margaret eventually settled down in Forestfach on a farm called Glanyrafon, a farm with a mill attached. Dan Davies also worked down the pit following his family tradition as his dad
William Davies better known as Wil Sar ran the farm at Pontalasau, Morriston called Maeseglwys.

He also worked down the pit, made coffins and buried the dead as he was a joiner and also had time to practice country medicine. He originally came from Llanderbie where the family is well
known.

Craig-y-nos- view of the Glass Conservatory and balconies

My grandparents had four children called Ifor, John William, my mother Bertha Kathlyn Mary and Margaret. The fourth child Margaret Davies, born February 29th 1920 and died March 12th 1920 due to complications in birth and tuberculosis.

Grandmother Margaret died Dec 14th 1920 at Cyrola Sanatorium, Neath. Two years later, Dan Isaac died Sept 6th 1922 due to an accident down the pit where he was crushed between two trams, leaving three children as orphans so they were taken under the wings of the formidable Aunty Annie. She lived on a small holding called 'Tredigarfach' on the road that leads to Felindre, until British Steel built the steelworks in its place. She raised all the children that were orphaned from the Davies family as there were others besides my mother and her two brothers.

Fate decided to strike once more as young Ifor was killed in a motorbike accident in Llangyfellach at the age of fifteen. My mother and her brother William continued to live on the farm until my mother had to go into service to supplement the income of the farm. It was during this time that she met my father Chris O'Connor who was home on leave from the army. He was in the Kings own regiment at Brecon.

It was during their courtship that my mother asked aunty Annie permission to marry even though she was 21. The answer was 'No' the reason being that Chris O'Connor was an Irish Catholic. However, this did not deter her as she married him anyway but the Davies family ostracised her. She lived with my father's mother at 31 St.Georges Terrace now known as Hannover Street where i was born on 1st October 1938. My father was still in the army at the time. Two years later my sister Eileen was born. It would appear my mother was asked to leave as there were too many people at the house. My sister was actually born in Page Street in Nov 20, 1940.

At this time my father was away in the war in Africa so she was like a single parent struggling to raise 2 young children on her own. It must have been an awful time for her as she was forced to accept lodgings at her sister-in-laws in Richards Place behind the police station in Swansea. I have fond memories when I lived there as all the children slept in one bed, 3 at the top and 3 at the bottom.

I remember being snug as a bug with the welsh multi-coloured blanket on us. I know I was a handful for my mother as I remember running around the streets whilst the air raid was on, talkingto the ladies on the search lights while everyone else were taking cover in the shelters.

Now as I reflect at the age of 71, it is strange how something's are very vivid in my memory whilst other things are obscure.

It was when I received the book 'The Children of Craigynos' from my second cousin Hilary Thomas as a gift on my 71st birthday, some of the things in the book had answered the dreams I've been having for years and still have these dreams now.

The Glass Conservatory - babies ward

Most strange dream is about the house with many glass windows in and being tied down to the bed and travelling down a corridor on a trolley with lights passing overhead. Another one of my dreams was about horses and the blacksmith working, shoeing horses and quenching the iron shoe in a water barrel at the side of the door. The next one was, rolling down the hill which was full of nettles and wild flowers. Being locked in the cupboard under the stairs.

Now as I try to remember Craigynos it is a complete blank. Maybe I shut out the memories because of the death of my mother as she died a day before my 5th birthday.

I try to ascertain as to when my mother, sister and myself arrived at Craigynos and I can only do this by the last photograph that was taken in Swansea in July 1942 so, this leaves 13 months from the photograph to the time of her death in Sept. 30th 1943.

I do know that I was released before my sister and looked after by my aunt Molly. She was the one who gave me the photographs in 1990 at the re-union of the family arranged by me but that's another story.

Budgies and memories- Frances Purcell 1953-54

2009-11-02T18:31:00.003Z

Ann with Bubbles

Memory is a curious thing ...

Take the case of my budgies, Bubble and Squeak ( named by Dr Huppert!). The other day I spoke to Frances Heenan ( nee Purcell). We were both children in Ward 2 together yet neither of us remembers the other.
Except the budgies.

I tell her the budgies were mine. She is surprised. She says after I left it was her responsibility to look after them though she assures me that there was only one not two.

Anyway one day she didn't tie the string properly on the cage door .

And Bubbles flew away.

Frances apologises, half a century later, for the mishap.

" I am so sorry."

I am lost for words. I never ever expected to meet someone, even if only over the phone, who not only remembered my budgies but had actually been put in charge of them.

Gwyneth Davies- Frances Purcell

2009-10-24T11:51:00.002+01:00

Frances Purcell emailed:

" I am so pleased to hear that Gwyneth recovered and
went on to become a doctor. She was such a
lovely gentle girl.

I did not achieve any thing so grand.

Some years after I recovered my mother passed
away and I looked after my father and brother and sister for years.

I did not marry until I was 38 years old when ."

Traditional role of unmarried daughter
Frances, your story is that of so many young women in Wales where it was expected that the daughter would give up her life to look after elderly relatives.
When the family trawled around relatives to care for my 80 year old grandmother living on an isolated Welsh hill farm my name came up (" Ann is not married...she can do it").
I resisted the pressure though on at least two other occasions when an emergency call came to return to help out on the family farm I did succumb, giving up my job and flat in London to return to Wales.

Only last week I heard of a friend's aunt, now in her late 70's, who said her life stopped at 34 years of age when she left her secretarial job in London to return to the family farm to care for her ageing parents.

Frances Heenan (nee Purcell)- Ward 2, 1953-54

2009-10-18T11:54:00.013+01:00

Frances Purcell e-mailed me after googling Craig-y-nos.

She is the only one, to my knowledge, to have come forward who spent most of her time inside Ward 2. ( This is curious because most of the children, around 15-18, were in fact inside the ward with only 6-8 girls on the balcony. )

Frances wrote:

"I was a patient in Ward 2 at Craig-y-Nos Hospital from 1953-54.

The girls called me Percy because my maiden name was Frances Purcell.

I would love to hear from anyone remembers me or would like to write to me?

If so, you are very welcome to write to me at my email address: francis.heenan@ntlworld.co.uk

I very much look forward to hearing from any of you.

I was mostly in the ward but was on the balcony for some months. It was winter and so very cold, a hot water bottle froze in one of the girls' beds.

The doctors

Dr Mullhall

Dr Williams

I wonder if Dr Mullhall is still with us? ( Yes he is still alive and living near Brecon - Ann)
Both he and Dr.Williams were loved by all the girls. After their rounds we would all say who we liked the best, a bit naughty for girls so young.

Memories

Gwyneth Davies suffered from asthma and Dr Huppert put her out on the balcony during a foggy spell in the hope that it would cure her. She had a severe attack one night . Even as a young girl Gwyneth wanted to be a doctor and she became one .

"I remember the Christian names of some of the girls on the ward; there was Brenda with short dark hair, Ann Norris who was there before I arrived, Gwyneth a lovely girl with long brown hair, who had severe asthma, Marilyn who was told her mother had died, someone pulled the curtains around her and left her to cry. There was a girl with lovely red hair from Swansea, I can't remember her name. Her parents gave her a big doll. "

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves is published by the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History
of Medicine, UCL , price £9.99 and is available from Waterstones and most major bookshops or from Amazon online.

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" - book

2009-10-13T13:01:00.001+01:00

It is good to hear "The Children of Craig-y-nos" is selling in Wales.

Carole Hughes sent me the following email:

"i had my copy of the book the children of craig y nos in may at craig y nos
but my daughter and son in law went to swansea and in waterstones there they had a lot of copies of the book

but amanda and phillip then went walking in neath abbey they walk miles and philip spoke to a sister williams from craig y nos

she knew nothing of the book but sent a young man into swansea to waterstones where she had her copy

many people who were either patients or nursing staff never knew but we live so near sister williams we never seen her before or since that day."

Raymond O'Connor- Lincolnshire

2009-10-11T18:51:00.004+01:00

Glass conservatory for the babies and small children

And still the "children of Craig-y-nos" are coming forward in search of their missing past.

Only the other day I received this very moving email from Raymond O'Connor in Lincolnshire:

" I was one of those children at Craig-y-nos along with my sister Eileen and my mother Bertha Kathlyn Mary O'Connor nee Davies who died on 30th September 1943 at Craigynos.

Her death certificate was signed by G. Richards M.B. (cause of death tuberculosis).

As I was just 5 year old when my mother died and my sister Eileen was 3, do you have any records as to when my sister and myself were released after my mother's death?

I do have 2 photographs; the first one is with my parents at the age of approximately 18 mon.ths, and the second one is my mother, my sister and myself just before she went into Craig-y-nos.

My father was away in the war.

Incidentally, I just received a copy of your book from my aunt in Swansea as a birthday
present. I will be 71 on the 1st of October and my sister Eileen will be 69 on 20th Nov.
The full story about our childhood and our adult life and the way everything affected us is
a very, very sad story."

Raymond added:
" To this day I still have dreams of the glass conservatory.

I now live in Lincolnshire."

I have to tell Raymond that all records were destroyed - that's why we tried to piece together 40 years of missing Welsh history in our book The Children of Craig-y-nos available online from Amazon or your local Waterstones.

Waterstone's Abergavenny

2009-10-07T12:21:00.016+01:00

Just heard that a friend finally managed to get a copy of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" from Waterstone's Abergavenny though he placed an order several weeks ago.

I tell people it is quicker to get it online from Amazon

Valerie Brent and Susan Davies- surprise!

2009-10-04T12:05:00.006+01:00

Valerie Brent ( left) with Susan Davies ( nee Evans) at her 70th birthday party

Susan, a former child patient in Craig-y-nos in the early 1950s had a double surprise the other day.

For her family gave her a surprise 70th birthday party and retired nurse Valerie Brent, the star guest presented Susan with a copy of "The Children of Craig-y-nos".

Valerie says:" Susan was unable to make the book launch but she did come to the reunion the year before. She hadn't been able to get hold of a copy of the book so I got her one and gave it to he. She was absolutely delighted."

Comment
Frances Purcell said...
I could not make the Exhibition.

I was a patient in Ward 2 at Craig-y-Nos Hospital from 1953 – 1954

The girls called me Percy because my Maiden name was Frances Purcell.

I would love to hear from anyone remembers me or would like to write to me? If so. you are very welcome to write to me at my email address: francis.heenan@ntlworld.co.uk

I very much look forward to hearing from any of you.

Kind regards, Frances

Jonathain Aitken and TB

2009-09-29T10:27:00.005+01:00

I was surprised to hear former MP Jonathan Aitken talking on Radio 4 this morning ( "The House I Grew Up in") about his time as a three year old in hospital with TB.

The son of a wealthy, powerful Dublin family he caught TB from his Irish nanny and spent four years encased in plaster in the Cuppae hospital run by nuns.

He said his four years lying motionless on an iron frame taught him to be stoical, and time spent in this TB hospital proved useful training for his seven months in prison in adult life after being caught lying to the court.

He says he was happy there. He had become institutionalised and accepted that was the way life was. He remembers being wheeled outdoor for fresh air and how Sister Mary Finbar would order them to breathe deeply for the "fresh air treatment".

"It was all very theatrical. It was as if she was conducting an orchestra."

Life in the Dublin hospital though seems far less austere then in Craig-y-nos as our stories reveal in"The Children of Craig-y-nos". ( available from Amazon and a number of good bookshops.

Those of us in Craig-y-nos, including myself, lived out on the balconies all year round including in the snow - not wheeled out for a brief period each day.

Benefits of the "Children of Craig-y-nos" project

2009-09-26T10:58:00.002+01:00

Just heard of another instance where an ex child patient said how much he had benefited from being able to talk about his early traumatic days as a child in Craig-y-nos as a result of this project.

"For years something that had been hidden is now out in the open. And that must be a good thing," said Terry Hunt.

Balcony boys - reunited

2009-09-22T22:24:00.003+01:00

Roy Harry and Gerwyn Davies were both "balcony boys" in the 1940s and they have just discovered they live less than a quarter of a mile from each other in Cwmavon.

"We have never met since those days in Craig-y-nos but we plan to do so now," says Roy.

They have been in telephone contact after discovering through photographs on the blog that they were there together.

History of TB hospitals- Abergele and Craig-y-nos

2009-09-13T18:57:00.005+01:00

Valerie Brent rang to say she is reading a book on "The History of Abergele hospital - confronting the white plague". From her description it would appear to be similar to "The Children of Craig-y-nos" but a search on the internet reveals it is out of print and neither are there any second-hand copies available.

I wonder if anyone knows of a copy? It was published in 1999 by Gee and Son, Denbeigh Printers. ISBN -0707403316.

Meanwhile I have heard from a university friend at Swansea University that Waterstones are now stocking "The Children of Craig-y-nos".

And Pamela Hamer tells me ( on Facebook) that all her friends and relatives are queueing up to borrow her copy!....

Girl Guides-Children of Craig-y-nos

2009-09-05T10:21:00.016+01:00

This month the Girl Guides movement begins celebrating its centenary and there will be many stories of the ways it has benefited the community.

Mair Harris ( nee Edwards) centre with some of the Girl Guides on Ward 2 balcony

But there is one story that stands out, at least in the memories of girls who were living in an isolated TB sanatorium in a remote Welsh castle.

For Craig-y-nos had its own group, formed by an ex-patient, Ina Hopkins who returned as a medical secretary.( She was the captain of her local troop.)

I was one of those girls. It was our first link with the outside world , apart from monthly visitors. It gave us hope.

I remember how we used to cook sausages on an open fire on the balcony- something I suspect that would contravene today's Health and Safety regulations!

Christine Perry ( nee Bennett) is another. Christine excelled as a Girl Guider and became a leader, even representing the troop at a local event, the first occasion for anyone from the TB sanatorium taking part in an outside community event.

Nurse Glenys Davies recalls the occacion that Christine had their flag blessed in Abercrave church:

"I always remember that she was carrying the standard and Sister Morgan was always worried about the clock outside the door. ‘Watch that clock, watch that clock!’ Poor Christine was worked up and down it comes, oh dear, dear. The end of the world! It was only a clock anyway."

Girl Guides on Ward 2 balcony. Christine is on the far left back row.

Those of us who were Girl Guiders in Craig-y-nos have very fond memories of the organisation for it brought a bit of the outside world into our isolated lives.

The Girl Guide troop in Craig-y-nos is remembered with very fond memories for it was the first positive step by an outside organisation to introduce a sense of normality into lives of children removed from the outside world.

Photos from the collection of Ann Shaw ( nee Rumsey) and Christine Perry ( nee Bennett).

Children return to Craig-y-nos

2009-09-03T11:37:00.006+01:00

Ann Shaw ( nee Rumsey) and Roy Harry beside the lake in Craig-y-nos during recent return visit.

Ann on the balcony of Ward 2, 1951

Roy on the balcony of Ward 1 (far right), 1945

Now that we have "discovered" Craig-y-nos after more than half a century some of us keep returning to renew friendships and memories of past times. I was in Wales recently for research on Sully and took the opportunity to call in at Craig-y-nos to meet up with Roy and his family for lunch.

Haydn Beynon- deceased July 16 2009

2009-08-22T11:33:00.014+01:00

Haydn on the boys balcony, age 7, 1931

I have just received the following email from Gillian Beynon:

"I thought I should tell you you that my dear father- in- law passed away during the early hours on 16 July rather suddenly - he was 84 and had been enjoying our son's birthday only hours before his passing.

I would like to thank you on behalf of all our family for including him in your book and for the enjoyment he took in the reunions and helping you to gather information to put your findings in print.

The book is remarkable thanks to the testimonies of people like my father in law and many others and you have done them proud by setting the record straight and producing a book to be proud of and be of interest to many for years to come.

His experiences like others will live on in print and the book is a marvellous keepsake for us all."

Extract from "The Children of Craig-y-nos", Haydn's story:

"My bed was on the balcony and I can remember sitting up in bed with pyjamas on and my mother and father with overcoats and scarves and hats on, the snow and the rain coming in, and they'd be shivering. It was cold but you didn't feel it after a while.

...You were given four squares of Cadbury's chocolate, and I didn't qualify because if you didn't eat your afters, you couldn't have chocolate. I can remember vividly...every few days the curtains would go around a bed and porters would wheel somebody away who had died. I was only a youngster but it seemed that there were lots of people dying at that time, like every other day.

Craig-y-nos was monotonous, one day after the other. The difference between Highland Moors, where I went in 1932, and Craig-y-nos is that there you were encouraged to play."

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, published by the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, price £9.99p is available online Amazon.co.uk or from any good bookshop, Brecon museum, Val's newsagent in Ystradgynalais and through the Welsh Book Council.

Craig-y-nos Tearoom

2009-08-18T12:16:00.008+01:00

Paul Brandon outside the former gardeners shed in Craig-y-nos

Last week while in Wales I met Paul Brandon in Craig-y-nos.
He runs a specialist food company called Unusualfoods based in Ystalyfera and he also has a tearoom out of the former gardener's shed in Craig-y-nos Castle.

Now that brought back memories! for that was the place that we "balcony girls" from Ward 2 used to go and sit and talk to the gardeners while all the time Sister Morgan and Dr Hubbard thought we were walking around the grounds filling our lungs with fresh air. Instead we were ensconced in a warm smoky fug sharing tea and biscuits with the men.

Paul tells me that many ex-patients come into his cafe for refreshments and since they heard about the book
"The Children of Craig-y-nos" they want to buy a copy.

" I don't know what to tell them because we don't sell books, neither do I know where they can get a copy from. But there is clearly a demand for it and I would be happy to stock it if I could find it."

From next February Paul will be opening a much bigger tearoom and Welsh Craft Centre within the Craig-y-nos Country Park Visitors Centre and he will be stocking books there.

Meanwhile I have put Paul in touch with some suppliers who may be prepared to let him have some copies as a "one-off" until his new premises are up and running.

Welsh Book Council - "The Children of Craig-y-nos"

2009-08-18T10:40:00.016+01:00

Dafydd Jones of the Welsh Book Council tells me that they will be stocking"The Children of Craig-y-nos"" so museums and shops specialising in Welsh literature and crafts will in future be able to order direct from them.

The glitch seems to have been over the fact that the book is "print-on-demand" and wholesalers are still trying to figure out a business role model for dealing with it.

The book is, of course, available online from Amazon.co.uk, price £9.99 or from any good bookseller.

Comment:
Delyth Morgans said...
Thank you for your cooperation with the Welsh Books Council. The book is now available on
www.gwales.com

Brecon museum and "The Children of Craig-y-nos"

2009-08-17T11:31:00.014+01:00

Brecon museum: Caroline Gorman (top) and Helen Weeks with copies of "The Children of Craig-y-nos"

Call in to Brecon museum to see how "The Children of Craig-y-nos" is selling and am horrified to find that the museum have not been able to obtain copies from the Welsh Book Council though we had been assured they would have it. Neither is it available from their on-line site.

Fortunately I had a couple of copies with me so I was able to let the museum have them.

The demand for the book followed a review in the Brecon and Radnor Express some weeks ago.

"Children of Craig-y-nos" - Surrey and Glasgow

2009-08-17T11:30:00.000+01:00

Receive phone call from Surrey.

It's Mary Davies who was in Craigynos as a toddler.

" I am ringing to say I have just bought the book ( I ordered it through my local bookshop) and I would like to say how pleased I am with it."

A friend rang from Glasgow also rings to say she loaned her copy of the book to a Glasgow doctor who was one of the "balcony boys" in the days when sanatoriums ringed the city.

He too is fascinated by the Craig-y-nos story.

Cerwyn Davies one of the "balcony boys" - 1945

2009-08-14T12:01:00.011+01:00

Gerwyn Davies and other boys on the balcony , 1945

Book launch of The Children of Craig-y-nos
Cerwyn Davies brought along some photos , including this one, to the book launch/reunion and he says he found it a "memorable and very poignant occasion".

Cerwyn tells me that one big memory that stands out from his time in Craig-y-nos Castle is the occasion that:

"My uncle brought me in some records for the gramophone and I threw them like flying saucers over the balcony into the bushes. One of the gardeners reported me and I got put in a straitjacket."

He had an older brother who used to come along to the castle for the monthly visiting but had to stand out in the courtyard or go to the cafe opposite and his brother remembers an outside lavatory with a photograph of Adelina Patti in it.

" I gave my brother a copy of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" to read and he got very upset. I told him "You weren't the one in there having tubes pushed down your throat or tied up in straitjackets!"

But my brother says it brought back all the memories of those days."

Roy Harry, age three and a half , 1945-46

2009-08-03T18:17:00.004+01:00

Roy Harry rings to tell me he is the boy wearing glasses. He had never seen this photo before so I am putting him in touch with Gerwyn Davies who sent the photo in.

Book launch - May 1st Craig-y-nos Castle

2009-07-27T12:41:00.004+01:00

Caroline Boyce ( nee Havard) and her husband Paul volunteered to register everyone attending the book launch of "The Children of Craig-y-nos".

Like many ex-patients the day was particularly emotional for Caroline because she had not returned to Craig-y-nos since she left as a child in 1950.

On the balcony of Ward 2, 1950 (from left to right) Mary Davies, Ann Rumsey ( in bed) and Caroline Havard

Ann and Caroline in Scotland

Today Caroline lives in Scotland - about fifteen miles from my home! something we only discovered through this project.

"My lost childhood" -Bobbie

2009-07-23T10:47:00.005+01:00

Main entrance to the Adelina Patti sanatorium, Craig-y-nos Castle

Barbara Glover, known to her friends as “Bobbie, felt as she approached her 70th birthday a desire to find out about her missing three years of childhood.

All she knew was that she had spent it in a Welsh sanatorium a place she was put as a three year old in 1943 with TB of the bones and she was to remain there until 1946.

“My one big memory was of American soldiers marching past and throwing sweets on to our beds which had been wheeled out for the fresh air.

“But my parents never talked about my time there.
After they died I went through their papers hoping to find some clues.
There was nothing,” said “Bobbie”, speaking to me on the phone from her home in Peterborough.

The eldest of 9 children her Irish parents had emigrated to Birmingham in the late 1930’s. But she had no idea why she ended up in a Welsh hospital “ unless we had been evacuated there during the war”.

“ All I know is that my parents could only afford to visit once a year at Christmas time.”

Another big memory is the day she left.
“ These two strangers came to get me, they were my parents, and I screamed and screamed because I didn’t want to leave the nurses and the other children. When I got home to Birmingham I had to learnt walk again because I had a calliper on and there were these other children there- my brothers and sisters whom I didn’t know and my mother was expecting again.”

The Glass Conservatory, used for babies and toddlers*

At a recent family gathering she was talking about these early memories, when her daughter, Karemah, picked up her laptop and said:” lets find out!”

She typed TB sanatorium Wales into Google and up popped the “Children of Craig-y-nos” blog.
“ I was amazed when I saw the photos. It fitted in with my memories.”

“Bobbie” is thrilled to discover her missing past and I have given her the names of people who were there at the same time as her.
She now plans to visit Craig-y-nos.

Looking back over her own life she says it has “had its ups and downs”.

“I married at 18 and my first husband died of cancer when I was 26 leaving me with two young children.
Five years later I met another man who wanted more children.
“But on the day I came home with the baby he announced he was leaving me for a woman he had met in the office.”

The story has a happy ending though for Bobbie met another man and they have been happily married for twenty years.

And so the story of “The Children of Craig-y-nos” continues….

*The Glass Conservatory has recently been refurbished into a function room for the Castle which specialises in weddings and ghost tours.

Boys on the balcony - 1945

2009-07-13T14:11:00.005+01:00

Gerwyn Davies has sent in these photos of his time in Craig-y-nos. He was there for 14 months up to 1945. We are still trying to put names to the children.

Do you recognize anyone? If so email :annshaw@mac.com

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves is published by The Wellcome Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, in paperback, price £9.99p and available from most good bookshops or online from Amazon.co.uk

TB Survival Project

2009-07-08T11:56:00.002+01:00

I wonder how many of you know about the TB Survival Project? a former colleague of mine gave me this link.
n The Herald newspaper , where I worked for over 20 years, in Glasgow.

Sadly she died recently from TB.
TB Survival Project

Mary Davies- how the internet reunited the "lost children"

2009-06-29T10:48:00.014+01:00

Mary, age 9 , Ward 2 balcony, 1951

Mary Davies ( nee Morris) with her grandson, Stephen, at the book launch of "The Children of Craig-y-nos".

Often it was the children and grandchildren of the original "children of Craig-y-nos" that made the initial contact with me like Stephen (above). This is his original email on behalf of his grandmother:

"I was in Craig-y-nos in 1951. The photo shows me holding a teddy bear taken in September it was a present from my family for my 9th birthday in August. I don’t remember much about my stay only that I was out on the balcony and when I was rainy and windy they had to put tarpaulin on top of the bed to stop it getting wet. While in Craig-Y-Nos I made 3 good friends one was called Mary Jones one Jeanette Wakeham but I cannot recall the name of the 3rd one, we had a photograph taken but I can’t find it but will keep looking for it, and post it up on here when I do. I also remember doing lessons much to my disgust!

When I had a bungalow built I named it Craig-y-nos after my experience of the real Craig-Y-Nos.

I have been married for 46 years have 3 children and 4 grandchildren. The thing that sticks out in my mind was my parents were only allowed to see me one weekend a month. They only came one day as it was to far to travel as we lived in Rhayader in Mid Wales."

Mary still lives in Rhayader and, at our first official reunion two years ago, she was the first to arrive having driven alone for over two hours through the mountains.

This video clip captures her emotions on that momentous day:
Mary Davies

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, paperback price £9.99., available from Brecon museum, Amazon.co.uk or most good bookshops.

Brian Richards - Bournemouth

2009-06-23T11:16:00.003+01:00

Brian Richards travelled all the way from his home in Bournemouth to attend the book launch of " The Children of Craig-y-nos".

Now a retired baker, he was in Craig-y-nos along with his two brothers.

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, paperback price £9.99., available from Amazon.co.uk or direct from Carole Reeves, Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, 183 Euston Rd., London, NW1 2BE. Phone 02076.798 135

Ellis Thomas and "The Children of Craig-y-nos"

2009-06-20T22:40:00.001+01:00

Both Carole Reeves and myself have received letters from Ellis Thomas regarding the book: "Children of Craig-y-nos":

"Have just received my copy of the book. What a marvellous production! I was
taking a first flick through it when Ann rang, asking if I'd received it!
The book I find absorbing, to be read and re-read. I thank you and Ann most
sincerely for creating something which I never thought I'd see in my time -
and all through an enquiry on the correspondence page of the local paper!"

Thank you Ellis. It is always good to have feedback.

Margaret Madock- at the book launch

2009-06-20T22:25:00.001+01:00

Margaret was a patient from 1951-53.

Gwanwyn Evans - 1931

2009-06-16T12:02:00.009+01:00

Gwanwyn Evans with her brother

Gwanwyn Evans, first lady mayor of the county of Brecknock (1981/82) who was in Craig-y-nos in 1931 as a ten year old.

"I am reading "The Children of Craig-y-nos"" and I have got to page 91...it is most interesting...do you know that I think it was Nan Davies* who took my place singing in the concert. The dates are not quite correct but it is such a long time ago... I had the best voice in the ward and I was so looking forward to it. My mother had sent me in a special frock to wear and a nurse had put my hair in rags the night before so that I would have ringlets.

Then I woke up with a temperature and I had to stay in bed. I think it was the excitement. But I was so disappointed!"

Eighty-eight year old Gwanwyn, who lives in Aberyscir near Brecon, had hoped to come to the book launch and had paid her deposit but she couldnt find anyone to bring her.
"Afterwards Glynne Lowe rang me up. We have known each other for years and neither of us knew that the other had spent years of our childhood in Craig-y-nos."
If I had known I would have got a lift with Glynne."

I mention my cousin, Edna Walters, who farms near Brecon.
" Of course I know Edna! " says Gwanwyn.
"She came to the book launch too."
"If only I had known..."
"She would have been delighted to have given you a lift."

Her husband Glynne Evans, former vice-chair of Powys Area Health Hospital is also reading the book with particular interest for he was involved in the decision to move the children to Talgarth.

*Nan Davies
Her story is on page 16 of the book- how the ghost of Adelina Patti tapped her on the shoulder and told her she would go out and sing the best she had ever done.

"The Children of Craig-y-nos", by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, price £9.99, is available from Brecon museum. It can also be ordered from any bookshop or online from Amazon.co.uk
Or contact Dr Carole Reeves, The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL, 183 Euston Rd., London, NW1 2BE. Phone: 02076 798 135.

Gareth Wyke at the book launch

2009-06-15T12:24:00.004+01:00

Gareth Wyke as a child in Craig-y-nos...

...returning as an adult

Gareth Wyke travelled all the way from Stourbridge in the West Midlands to attend the book launch of "The Children of Craig-y-nos".

He says of his five years in Craig-y-nos from the age of 5 in 1953:

"I think my time in hospital definitely effected the person I was to
become.I relate to words and phrases such as ones you mentioned, like'lost
childhood','loner','self reliant','independant' and could also add
'anti-social[sometimes]','unloved',and 'persecution complex'.
When I arrived home I had a new sister I'd never seen before and she used
to cry and say I wasn't her brother.
However,despite having 'matchstick legs' and being teased by new classmates
I made a full recovery becoming a PE teacher and playing rugby until I was
fifty."

Copies of the book "The Children of Craig-y-nos" can be ordered from any good bookseller . The number to quote is: ISBN-13: 978-0-85484-126-4.

There are two wholesalers who will be able to supply the book. These are
www.bertrams.com and www.gardners.com

Alternatively contact Dr Carole Reeves, Outreach Historian , The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, UCL,183 Euston Rd., London, NW1 2BE, price £9.99 or online from www.amazon.co.uk

"Children of Craig-y-nos" Hay Book Festival

2009-06-01T22:52:00.005+01:00

Emma Davies (left) and Emma Evans of the Welsh Book Council at the Hay Book Festival.

They are holding a copy of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" . The Welsh Book Council had very kindly agreed for me to display the book on their stand at very short notice and a number of copies were sold.

Children of Craigynos

2009-05-29T12:39:00.003+01:00

We are staying in a cottage in Llanigon belonging to Pollly Rogers and she tells me that a friend of hers has a relative who was interviewed by me for the book"Children of Craig-y-nos". They want to buy a copy. A signed copy.

Archbishop of Canterbury at Hay Festival

2009-05-29T12:32:00.003+01:00

Last night the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, and Desmond Tutu attended service in St Mary's church.

We arrive late. Very late. We are ushered through to the front pew marked "reserved" along with some other late-comers.

Afterwards a Catholic priest asks who we are. (Folk think we are celebrities from the Hay Festival.)
"Sorry, we are just late-comers!"
The priest is disappointed.

The Archbishop - who was a mere 5 yards from me - spoke about love and the power of healing. Afterwards I joined the queue to shake his hand.

You just never know what is going to happen at Hay next....

Dannie Abse

2009-05-29T12:16:00.004+01:00

Dannie Abse, Wales' greatest living poet, gave a reading of poems from his new book before a rapt audience.

One woman dares to chatter to her companion while he searches for the next poem and he whips his specs off and glares in her direction. She goes bright red and never says another word.

Afterwards I join the queue to get my two books signed.

Except in the queue I am joined by Arnold Whesker and his entourage of friends behind me. My courage fails me. No way could I begin to explain about Craig-y-nos with Whesker standing behind me.
So I wave them through.

In fact when I look at the long queue I decide to wait until the last.

Finally I am face to face with Dannie Abse.
He is charming.
He expresses surprise at the book "Children of Craig-of-nos" ( " I don't know anything about this") so I explain that it has only just been published and I show him his quote which Carole Reeves had picked to introduce the book.

He's delighted. He accepts a copy and he seems genuinely pleased to receive it.

Then he signs the two books: one for Carole and one for myself.

For Dannie Abse was a doctor, a chest specialist, before he became a poet.

Internet access

2009-05-29T12:11:00.003+01:00

First of all a moan about internet access at Hay. It is atrocious! dont know what they have done to it but in previous years there was no difficulty updating blogs on Festival site.

Now its a hit and miss operation. Mainly miss...
So its up to the Hay Tourist Office, join queue for computer then the agonising slow wait as the computer boots up and you try to connect...all the time the minutes and money is ticking away.

Oh yes and the Tourist office closes at 5pm so no chance of using it in the evening.

Come on Hay Festival- you can do better than this! and to compound the problem I cant use Twitter either because my Iphone is on O2 and this is an orange mobile phone area.

Dannie Abse

2009-05-26T11:06:00.003+01:00

Dannie Abse will be talking later today. Have just bought his book and will give him

a copy of "The Children of Craig-y-nos". We have a quote by him in the book:

"TB I've got
You know what TB signifies?
Totally buggered. He laughed.

His sister cried."

Mari Friend

2009-05-24T15:39:00.003+01:00

Mari Friend ( nee Jenkins) with her husband, Peter, and Ann Shaw (nee Rumsey)at the book launch"Children of Craig-y-nos" in Craig-y-nos Castle.

Says Ann:"We were children in Craig-y-nos together. It is great to meet up with so many friends again."

Hay Book Festival

2009-05-23T21:20:00.002+01:00

Delivered books -"The Children of Craig-y-nos"-to Welsh book stand at Hay Festival.
They have sold three today and I have more back in my rented cottage - thanks to Carole Reeves sending them in advance from London though they are intended for the Brecon museum later in the week.

Scorching hot weather in Hay. Town sold out of sunscream and the public loos next to the Tourist Information Office only flush intermittently.

The London literrati who have decamped here for the week are not amused.

2009-05-21T10:47:00.004+01:00

Cynthia Mullan, director of the Sleeping Giant Foundation and Len Ley, local historian at the launch of the book "The Children of Craig-y-nos" in the restored Glass Conservatory of Craig-y-nos Castle

Some people are having difficulty ordering

'The Children of Craig-y-nos' through local bookshops.

Dr Carole Reeves has asked me to point out that:

"'The Children of Craig-y-nos' is available through bookshops and on Amazon

(www.amazon.co.uk) if you prefer to order online.

If your local bookshop tells you that they don't know how to order it (as happened to someone

recently) tell them to contact their wholesaler quoting the book's ISBN

number. This is ISBN-13: 978-0-85484-126-4. This number is unique to the

book and will identify it immediately.

There are two wholesalers who will be able to supply the book. These are

www.bertrams.com and www.gardners.com

Most bookshops will deal with these

wholesalers."

(photo: Karen Howard)

Children of Craig-y-nos - a healing project

2009-05-19T11:12:00.006+01:00

(book launch) - photo Karen Howard

Many people are telling me how they found being involved with the Children of Craig-y-nos project a healing process.

For the first time, and I include myself, we were able to talk about those experiences in childhood which had been buried deep in our minds, dark secrets from the past which we dared not talk about. Now it has all been brought out into the open and we realise that it is no longer a taboo subject, and we feel healed by the process of being able to talk and share these experiences with others who went through it .

"Children of Craig-y-nos"by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves, published by The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, price £9.99p

available online through Amazon.co.uk, as a free PDF file http://www.ucl.ac.uk/histmed/library/craig_book

Val's newsagent in Ystradgynlais - I have just heard that they sold out of the books as they were being unpacked and they have placed another order!

Any bookshop will order the book for you. If there is any difficulty the ISBN number is :

ISBN -10: 0-85484-126-1

ISBN-13:978-0-85484-126-4

Alternatively, ring Carole Reeves: 02076.798 135 or write to her:

Dr Carole Reeves,

The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine,

183 Euston Rd.,

London,

NW1 2BE

One reason we sold out so quickly at the book launch was that people were buying them up as Christmas presents! in the end we had to say that ex-patients had priority.

More launch photos-at Craig-y-nos Castle

2009-05-17T11:50:00.005+01:00

Malcolm Shaw ( Ann's husband ) who was responsible for digitising and "cleaning" all the photographs with Gwen Jones, a family friend from Llanbedr.

Pam Hamer ( nee Osmond) who was a child in plaster duringthe late 1940s out on the balcony and woke one night to find a rat running up inside her bed. " I felt its long tail against my face I screamed and the night nurse appeared. She told me it was Joey the pet rat from the kitchen who had come to see me."

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" is available online from Amazon.co.uk or Dr Carole Reeves: 02076 798 135. Alternatively any bookshop will order it for you.

2009-05-15T22:09:00.005+01:00

Ann and Carol signing books at the launch of "The Children of Craig-y-nos".

(photo: Karen Howard)

Christine and Beryl at book launch

2009-05-14T12:55:00.005+01:00

Christine Perry ( nee Bennett) and Beryl Rowlands ( nee Richards) at the book launch of "The Children of Craig-y-nos".

(Photo: Karen Howard)

1950s- Pat and Ann - Craig-y-nos Castle

2009-05-12T23:30:00.006+01:00

Pat Stickler ( nee Moore) and Ann Shaw ( nee Rumsey at the book launch.*

Says Pat: " I was in the bed next to Ann when she came in. I was told not to frighten her with ghost stories because she was too ill."

*"The Children of Craig-y-nos" by Ann Shaw and Carole Reeves is available online at Amazon.co.uk or direct from Dr Carole Reeves: 02076 798135

1940s Reunion at book launch

2009-05-11T22:46:00.007+01:00

Nurse Glen with ex patient Roy Harry

All from the 1940s ex- patients (left to right) Christine Raybold, Vera Blewett and Roy Harry with nurse Valerie Brent (extreme right)

Megan Thomas ( 1941-1944) " I came out just after my 17th birthday"

Book signing - Craig-y-nos Castle

2009-05-09T23:28:00.006+01:00

Dr Carole Reeves, Outreach Historian with the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine, University College London and Ann Shaw co-authors of the book "The Children of Craig-y-nos" * signing copies of the book at the recent launch in the restored Glass Conservatory in the Castle.

Some of the people present had been child patients in the Conservatory.

* Book available online from Amazon.co.uk or

Dr Carole Reeves
Outreach Historian
The Wellcome Trust Centre
for the History of Medicine at UCL
183 Euston Road
London NW1 2BE

Or Val's newsagent, Ystradgynlais

Free PDF file to download from
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/histmed/library/craig_book

(photo: Karen Howard)

Launch top story on UCL site

2009-05-07T23:03:00.002+01:00

Our book launch of "The Children of Craig-y-nos" is the top story on the University of London online site. Follow this link http://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/0905/09050504

Roy Harry

2009-05-07T14:07:00.007+01:00

Roy Harry at the book launch in Craig-y-nos Castle

Roy as a child after his time in Craig-y-nos.

In the book "Children of Craig-y-nos" Roy wrote an account of his experience of having a gastric lavage.
This is the procedure whereby a child was held, often by more than one nurse, while another pushed a tube down the child's throat to extract fluids from the stomach.

This was then injected into guinea pigs. If the guinea pigs lived you were cured and could go home.

He says of his 18 months in Craig-y-nos:" I went home singing in Welsh with nits in my hair."

Free download of "Children of Craig-y-nos"

2009-05-06T14:22:00.005+01:00

You can download "Children of Craig-y-nos" for free by clicking on the following link:

http://www.ucl.ac.uk/histmed/library/craig_book

Then click on 'free download' in the text.

Or you can order a copy online from
Amazon.co.uk

A newsagent in Ystradgynlais has expressed an interest in stocking the book because so many customers have already asked for it. We will let you know when she has them.

Fifty years on: Children of Craig-y-nos- book launch

2009-05-05T11:23:00.009+01:00

(from left to right) Christine Perry ( nee Bennett), Valerie Brent ( ex- nurse) and Beryl Richards ( nee Rowlands)

Christine has just forwarded me this photograph taken at last Friday's book launch so I thought it would be fun to put in photos of the time when they were in Craig-y-nos - over 50 years ago.

Christine in playful mode on the balcony of Ward 2 ( 1956)

Beryl with Tosca, the pony belonging to Dr Williams' daughters that the teenage patients used to ride using their dressing-gown girdles as halters- strictly forbidden of course!

"The Children of Craig-y-nos" is available from Amazon.com

Photos from Book launch

2009-05-04T12:40:00.008+01:00

(from left to right) Dr Carole Reeves, co-author and medical historian, Valerie Brent, ex nurse who worked at Craig-y-nos for two years as a teenager in the 1940s, Ann Shaw, ex-patient and co-author, Cynthia Mullane, director The Sleeping Giant Foundation, the local oral history charity who were very helpful in getting the project started.

Do you have photos from the book launch which you would like to share?
then send them on email to annshaw@mac.com

Book launch- Craig-y-nos Castle

2009-05-02T12:00:00.012+01:00

Dr Carole Reeves ( left) and Ann Shaw in the Glass Conservatory the day before the book launch.

Our 200 books sold out within 2 hours! Clive Rowlands opened it at noon . He told the story of his time as boy on the balcony and how he kicked a rugby wall straight throw the French windows and got put in a straitjacket .

Cynthia Mullane of The Sleeping Giant introduced Carol and myself. The Sleeping Giant filmed the event. Lots of people took photos including my friend Karen Howerd from Scotland. Angela ( my neice) and her husband Roger sold the books while Carole Reeves and I signed them.

Caroline Boyce, (nee Havard) ex patient returning for the first time in 50 years had travelled from Scotland with her husband Paul and they helped at the launch by giving people name badges.

BBC journalist Geoff Ballinger interviewed many ex patients including Nurse Glenys Davies who was looking very well.

Barbara Pye now in her 80th year was there with two friends who used to visit her when she was in Craigynos as a young woman in 1947. Barbara was among the first in Britain to receive streptomycin.

It was also the first time back for Pamela Hamer and in my
introduction I told the story how she woke up one night on the balcony to find a rat I'm her bed!

Will post photos on blog on return to Scotland.

Says Carole: " We could have sold another 100 easily."

Don't worry if you didnt get a copy on the day. This is print-on-demand so we will never run out except for a few days.
Many people asked to be put on a list and we will contact you.

Meanwhile you can always get the book from Amazon.co.uk
or ask your local bookshop to order it for you. Price £9.99

Child's plaster bed- Craig-y-nos

2009-04-29T11:41:00.002+01:00

Roy Harry with Linda Delves and the plaster cast belonging to a relative

Here's a medical curiosity: how many people would recognize this cast as that belonging to a child with TB?

It was found in the attic of one Swansea family and Linda Delve rang me wondering what to do with it.

It belonged to her aunt Margaret Scott who was in Craig-y-nos as a toddler in the early 1940s. She was sent home as a five year old with the plaster cast and told to sleep in it every night.

Her aunt has since died.

Linda hopes to interest Swansea museum in adding it to their collection for
TB was rife in the Welsh valleys and many children spent years lying motionless in such contraptions.

Meanwhile, if you come to our book launch on Friday, May 1st, at Craig-y-nos Castle you will be able to see the plaster cast for it will be on display for a day.

Craig-y-nos - 2 nights as Christmas present!

2009-04-27T17:52:00.003+01:00

Patricia Stickler ( nee Moore) tells me she will be staying at Craig-y-nos Castle this week.

"My husband and I will be staying at the hotel for April 29/30 as a Christmas gift from my daughter, who is a dog fanatic. Just before Christmas she found one of the dog trust sites auctioning two nights at Craig-y-nos donated by the hotel and thought it would be an ideal present -or not???

Anyway, her partner stayed up all night to successfully bid for it.

I did have mixed feelings but when I heard of your book launch I decided to go ahead."

I look forward to meeting you Patricia, especially since we seemed to have been next to each other in bed some 50 years ago!

"Tied to the bed, in a straitjacket" - Joan, age 8, 1948

2009-04-23T19:03:00.003+01:00

Just when you think you have heard all the stories about Craig-y-nos yet another new one pops into my email box.

Wendy Dove says her mother, Joan Harris, was in Craig-y-nos for two years ( 1948-50.)

"I was brought up hearing many stories of her stay there, and I was always intrigued to know more! I will most definitely be buying your book.

"Most of her stories were quite negative. Mum was 8/9 at the time and strong minded, so I suppose she would be getting into a lot of mischief!"

So I rang Joan up. She lives in Coventry, works as a hotel manageress and had discovered this blog quite accidentally while googling her home town of Phillipstown near Tredegar.

"I couldn't believe it when I read the stories. Until now nobody would believe me when I told them the things that happened to me as a child in Craig-y-nos.

"I used to be tied to the bed on a regular basis, it was a strait-jacket they put you into and folded your arms in front of you. I used to get up to mischief. Once I threw a slipper and it went straight out of the window through the iron bars ( remember the iron bars on the windows? ) and landed in the courtyard near a nurse who was standing there with her boyfriend.

Well, I got a terrible row . They wanted to know whose slipper it was. So, back into the straitjacket for me."

"My bed war near the fire escape and I used to plan to escape. I thought if I followed the river it would lead me to Swansea to my grandmother's home."

Joan was one of nine children and the family moved to Coventry when she was 16. She is married with one daughter.

How about this for a coincidence: Joan was in the next bed to Caroline Boyce ( nee Havard) who lives 15 miles along the road from me in Scotland!...

Book launch -May 1st Craig-y-nos Castle

2009-04-22T11:15:00.003+01:00

Just checked with the Castle. So far 95 people have booked in for lunch amd there will be two sittings.

It should be quite a party!
We leave from Scotland next Wednesday flying down to Cardiff then picking up a hire car. We will be staying in Abercraf.

Ann and Mari on the farm

2009-04-22T11:10:00.002+01:00

Ann Shaw ( nee Rumsey) (left) and Mari Friend( nee Jenkins) at Ty-Llangenny farm.

After I left Craig-y-nos Mari used to come with her parents to visit and often she would stay on the farm.