“How poignant it is, now, to see those graves still standing in the cemetery, their story almost lost to the passage of time”

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Delyth Jewell, who represents Plaid Cymru, is one of four regional Senedd Members serving the South Wales East region.

In Wales, Palm Sunday is known as ‘Sul y Blodau’, or ‘the Sunday of the Flowers’ – and it’s a tradition to place flowers at the graves of loved ones who’ve passed away. 

This year, as every year, my family laid flowers on the graves of both of my sets of grandparents, who are all buried in Llanfabon cemetery, just above Nelson. But this year and last year, I’ve chosen to lay flowers at another set of graves as well.

Near the northern boundary of the churchyard, there is a monument flanked by 11 graves, marked only with the words: “Unknown, Albion Explosion 1894”. They are the graves of 11 men who were killed in the mining colliery disaster at Albion Pit in Cilfynydd in that year, but whose bodies were never identified. 

A decision was made to bury them together, and 13 years later, a monument was dedicated to their souls. My father has often taken me to see those graves, and to say a prayer for the unidentified men lying at rest there.

There is sometimes a wreath or a message placed at the monument from other mourners, though they stand in a largely forgotten part of the cemetery. 

At the time of the funeral, it’s evident that a large number of people from the community gathered at the cemetery: a report that was written in the Evening Express a week after the disaster, on June 29 1894, says: “An immense multitude accompanied these nameless 11 to their long home on the hill of St Mabon. 

“It seemed as if the entire community regarded each of the nameless 11 as the brother of all, and a vast throng acted accordingly, in accordance with the Welsh custom of venerable antiquity of accompanying the dead to the grave.”

The article states that the number of mourners numbered 500 people, who “paid as much reverence to the memory as if the poor fellows had been blessed with the presence of grief-stricken friends.”

How poignant it is, now, to see those graves still standing in the cemetery, their story almost lost to the passage of time. The newer graves in the churchyard (where my grandparents are buried), further down, are always cheerful with purple and pink flower tributes, but ivy and moss grow on the headstones of so many graves in that northern part of the cemetery. But every one of these people was loved once – and the same will be true for those poor 11 men, who were unknown to the world in death. 

“So for the past couple of years, I’ve decided to lay yellow and red roses at their graves – one for each of the unknown men – on Palm Sunday, the Sunday of the Flowers. 

It seems to me to be a fitting moment to remember these casualties of coal mining once again. I hope that their souls find peace.

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