They were bustled to the door, one of their helpers murmuring, ‘A couple of light-ales between the four of you; you’d get drunk on the smell of a bar-maid’s apron. Out with you!’ It was still only mid-afternoon as the four young men staggered across the street pushing people aside, hurling obscenities at any who objected by look or reprimand.
They were well-known in the small town of that South Wales district; where family, friends and society in general had apparently disowned them. All their fathers had been happy in being with their sons at the beginning; lovely it was too. Gareth’s father, Elwyn, had shared in changing his nappies, playing, cuddling and bottle-feeding his son. Like a boy with a puppy he was, till the novelty wore off. After that, his wife Bronwyn was often alone at night, her heart aching for his company. Her man was easily led and being still employed, part-time anyway, was the man with a bit of money in his pocket. Well, he had his pals too, see, and the booze gradually took over.
If, unbeknownst to those inside, you’d pushed through their front door back then and stood and listened for a while, you’d have understood why Bronwyn never could disown her son. Even now, with him overseas these past twenty-five years, she still felt the same, and the tears came with the anguish she felt deep inside. Gareth had tried hard at school, bless him. Would come home bursting to share something new he’d learned that day, her heart rejoicing in his infectious delight. It was different with Elwyn, Perhaps he was ashamed at his own lack of education, or maybe even jealous, but Gareth’s enthusiasm to share things with his father would be brushed aside. She’d tried to get him to understand what it meant to his son, but he was head of the house and stubborn with it.
At what point her son had gone off the rails, she couldn’t say. He hadn’t worked since leaving school; many coal-mines had closed and those still open near Corwen, in Denbigshire were down to one shift a day. Too many after the few jobs going; soul-destroying it was and the ‘low-life associates’ his father called his friends were his mates from school. Just ordinary lads on the same scrap-heap as himself, until the madness of Hitler offered them another way. Redemption, would you call it? Whatever it was, he and his friends joined up together in 1939. Howell Harris, Glyn Owen, David Rowland and Gareth Williams. In a few short months they’d learned to obey orders and march in step, use a rifle and bayonet, throw hand-grenades and die doing it in a farm orchard, West Germany, one warm spring day in 1945.
Sometimes, Bronwyn gets out the letter from Gareth’s commanding officer. It’s not a long letter but it takes her time to read it through her weeping. Then she walks down the street and looks at their names engraved in stone on the monument. Stone! There’s cold and lifeless for you. And over in Germany you can read the names on the monuments to their war dead. I wouldn’t be surprised if over half of those named, of whatever nationality, were at one time like Howell, Glyn, David and Gareth numbered amongst the low-life associates where they lived.
Ironic at times, life, isn’t it?
Dennis Crompton © 1997
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)
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