The Death of Griffith.

'My Tad was a leader of men and he remained at their head even on the afternoon they brought him home, pushed on a bier with a grey sheet of cloth over him. He was not a big man, but his arms and legs hung over each side. His hands swung free, wide palms and thick black fingernails; the same hands that had held me calmly before he left for work that morning. The procession came slowly down the street, past Robert’s house with his mother running madly out of their front door. My Mam tore up our street as well, like she could have rescued Tad then and there.

The men cried out to both women not to snatch away the sheet covering him, not until the undertaker could tend to his injuries. Mam ignored them.

She was a woman to be reckoned with, but the sight beneath the cover drove her to madness. Everyone one was crying around her, even the older experienced men, well used to tragedy, but the sight of my father reduced to nothing, broke their hearts as well.'

I wrote this as a draft story about a child growing up in a North Wales quarry village at the turn of the 19th century. It was loosely based on what happened to my great grandfather, Griffith.

Moi Jones, my grandfather was less than a year old when his mother Lizzie was widowed. All I was told by my own father, as I grew up, was that he had been killed instantly working in the quarry in 1891. A very large piece of slate had suddenly broken away above him, and he had been unable to get out of the way before it landed and crushed him.

His broken body had been brought home to his widow and only child on a bier, a sort of trolley, pushed along the street.

Another fatal accident occurred that week, as you can read from the newspaper report below. Health and safety standards were minimal to non existent in all the quarries and without doubt this loss of life was a regular occurrence. There were to be several organised protests and a major strike in the coming decade for better pay and working conditions. The owners of the quarries meanwhile became very wealthy men. I once visited a preserved stately home of one of these oligarchs ( I use the term in its Greek sense, 'Oligarkhia' meaning 'the rule of the few') and was particularly struck by his gold leafed bed upon which he clearly slept soundly without a conscience.

Griffith's brother in law, Moi's Uncle Ebenezer had only fairly recently left for New York State. Ebenezer was a quarryman as well but he was to move to New York and seek new opportunities.

The news of Griffith's death must have profoundly upset him and make him feel helpless as he read the letter with the news of the tragedy.

How would his sister Lizzie and his nephew cope with Griffith gone? Who would help them without an immediate source of income? What family were there left that could step in to help? What could Ebenezer do?

'Over the Mountains

Of the Moon,

Down the Valley of the Shadow,

Ride, boldly ride',

The shade replied-

'If you seek for Eldorado!'

Edgar Allan Poe 'Eldorado'