Mrs Davies The Pub

A Memory of Manmoel.

My grandmother was Mary Davies who kept the pub until her death in 1959. I was born and brought up in the tiny village on top of the mountain between Cwm and Hollybush. My dad George was a farmer in the area until his death in 1978. It was a wonderful childhood until I was 13, I thought everyone was an aunt or uncle. I was delighted to find postcards of the village which I've dated circa 1959. I went to Sunday School in the Chapel and Christmas parties in the old school (closed in 1952). My friends were Clive Burgess and Wynford Penny and we shot more Germans than the 8th Army and more Indians than John Wayne in the fields and woods around the village. The sheep pound near Tonyfald Farm was either the Alamo or Beau Geste's desert fort. We dug cabins in the earth covered with corugated iron sheets and turf, filled the insides full of dried ferns and then - lit a camp fire inside!! We went home as smoked as kippers.

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