The Railway

A Memory of Upper Killay.

I was born in 1941 in Cefncoed House, Pentwyn, overlooking Gwys Railway Station, Upper Cwmtwrch. I lived there for 7 or 8 years before moving to the Gurnos,  Lower Cmwtwrch.  My family lived in a compound made up of five houses built by my grandfather, Richard Lougher, for his children.

The village had a road, a railway, and the River Twrch running through it.  In Upper Cwm the road crossed the river in three places with the railway crossing the river and road in one place.  The railway also crossed the River Gwys, a tributary of the Twrch.That's enough about crossings.

When I think about Cwm the images that come to my mind are those of the railway, Gwys Station, and the steam engines that stopped there.  As children we would travel by train up the valley to visit my grandparents in Brynamman - only six miles away.  The highlight of the year was the family trip, by rail, to the Mumbles.  We would get on the train at Gwys Station and alight in Swansea, a distance of fourteen miles.  We would then walk to the seaside and get on the narrow gauge tram to the Mumbles.

The railway was also used for transporting coal from Brynhenllys and Cwmllynfell (the Clinc ) Collieries, to Swansea Docks.  One dangerous  "game" we played was to  place copper pennies on the rail  to be flattened by the iron or steel wheels of the train.

With the closure of the mines and an increase in road transport (buses and cars) the trains stopped and our village changed for ever.  Cwmtwrch is divided into Upper and Lower.  In Upper Cwm we played rugby - in Lower Cwm they played soccer.

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