With thanks to Clive Hughes of the Royal Welch Fusiliers Museum
for finding Owen Evans for us and supplying additional information
and a poem by Owen - with the help of Owen's Granddaughter
Owen’s bardic name was that of his father’s farm, "Rhiwlas". He married Sarah Jane Williams in December 1909. Owen was the hwsmon or foreman at Tanrallt Farm at some point. There came a junior farm servant or farm-boy named John Morris Jones.
In those days it was common for farm workers to agree with their employer in May and October each year whether they would stay on for another 6-month period. Those who weren't wanted, or who wanted to leave, went to the hiring fair to offer their services to other employers. John Morris came to the end of his first hiring period, and had given satisfaction, so was offered a second 6-months. As he started this, he bought himself a new pair of fustian trousers. The new pants caught the eye of Owen Evans, who was eminently capable of framing rural rhymes, and he got the urge to compose the following:
Trowsus di-fai i'r brenin,
Ni bu am undyn amgian cerpyn,
Ond daw amser i wisgo fesul dipyn
A bydd John Morris yn dinoeth wedyn.
This translates poetically as:
Trousers fit for a king’s wearing,
Ne’er a man wore better clothing;
But time will tell upon them, leaving
John Morris with his bare arse showing.
Translated by Howard Huws of Bangor.
During the First World War, Owen enlisted as Private 37345 in the Royal Welsh Fusiliers. When he was posted to the Western Front, he became 44132 in the 11th Battn. South Wales Borderers. He was a stretcher-bearer and was awarded the Military Medal for gallantry at Pilckem Ridge, 3rd Battle of Ypres, July-August 1917, when he was wounded.
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| Military Medal |
Early in 1918, Owen’s unit was disbanded and he was transferred to the 10th Battn. South Wales Borderers. He was badly wounded in April 1918, probably in the 38th (Welsh) Division's attack at Bouzincourt Ridge on the Somme. Owen was evacuated and died of his wounds on 30.4.18 in the base hospital in Rouen. He is buried at St.Sever Cemetery Extension, Rouen, France, Grave reference P. XI. J. 18B.
If you are visiting the St. Sever Cemetery in Rouen you might also like to visit the graves of Richard Molesworth Dennys (1884 – 1916), a Captain in the Loyal North Lancashire Regiment who was wounded on 12th July at Tara Redoubt on the Somme and died on 24th July 1916 in Rouen Hospital. His Grave Reference is Officers A 4 7.
And Francis St. Vincent Morris (1896 – 1917), a Second Lieutenant in No. 3 Squadron, Royal Flying Corps, attached to the Sherwood Foresters. He crash landed at Vimy Ridge and died on the operating table at the military hospital in Rouen on 27th April 1917. Grave Reference Officers B 6 5.
There are also seven women casualties of WW1 in that cemetery and seven more in the Extension Cemetery at Rouen.
NOTE: The Military Medal (MM) was a military decoration awarded to personnel of the British Army and other arms of the armed forces, and to personnel of other Commonwealth countries, below commissioned rank, for bravery in battle on land. The award was established in 1916, with retrospective application to 1914, and was awarded to other ranks for "acts of gallantry and devotion to duty under fire". The award was discontinued in 1993 when it was replaced by the Military Cross, which was extended to all ranks, while other Commonwealth nations instituted their own award systems in the post war period.
Sources: Find my Past, Free BMD
https://www.cwgc.org/find-records/find-war-dead/casualty-details/517429/OWEN%20EVANS/ and
information supplied by Owen's Grandaughter via Clive Hughes.
