Penygarn 1954 1960

A Memory of Pontypool.

My recollection is of my friends and me belonging to Penygarn Tabernacle Chapel for children's religious teachings. Every Sunday afternoon we all traipse across to the little house behind the chapel. There were only two rooms one downstairs for the younger children and one upstairs for the older children, in the cold weather there was always a roaring fire in the old blacken grates.

All the services in the big chapel was conducted by the Reverent Mr James, whom we all adored for at Christmas time, we all had to practise in the big chapel in front on the stage singing, Mr James a well built parson who gave is all, with perspiration dripping of his face and his shirt clammy with sweat, he was inspiring to watch him singing with such enthusiasm and encourage us all to raise our voices to the glory of god.

Christmas was a great event in Penygarn Tabernacle Chapel and so was the Easter Parade, where all the children of Penygarn had new dresses and easter bonnets ( we all would keep the dresses and bonnets, colour and design a secret and be upset if we wore the same). On Easter afternoon we congregate at the chapel, walk around Pengarn Streets and into Pontypool Park, where all the other chapel in the Monmouthshire area amalgamated in the grandstand. The grandstand echo with the rejoicing, and people of Pontypool would come to listen too, it was a grand occassion and I shall never forget the reverberation of that singing.