Robert Richard Owen

Taid was born in Holyhead and was named Robert Richard.  He was the second child of six siblings.  His father was Hugh Owen (born 1879) and his mother was Catherine Jane Edwards (born 1883).  His mother gave birth to six children and then died in 1919 of the Spanish Flu Pandemic, at the very young age of 35 when her youngest child was only 11 months old.  His father married again to Elizabeth Jones (born 17/5/1895) and they had a further three children.   Taid’s siblings were as follows:

• Hugh Owen – born 11/3/1904
• Robert Richard Owen– (known as Bob) born 21/1/1906
• William Edward Owen – born 11/2/1909
• Lillian Owen – born 18/12/1911
• Mary Jane Owen – born 29/1/1915
• Catherine Owen – born 8/3/1918
• Leonard Owen – born 30/2/1924
• Tegwyn Owen – born 1/6/1927
• David Owen – born 15/11/1929

Taid worked in his local newsagent shop since leaving school.  He was known as “Bob Papier” and was an extremely popular person around Holyhead.  He had known Mam all of his life since she was one of his cousins and he had lived with them for a short time after his mother died.  He married Mam in 1927 when he was 22 years old.  They had a baby daughter a few months later – Catherine Jane (Mum) and a son Clifford four years later.   Taid entered the Merchant Navy and signed on the Southern Empress an Antartic Factory Whale Ship on the 28/9/1940.   The ship sailed out of Liverpool and he was engaged as a Labourer.  The voyage was listed as Antarctic Whaling. He was discharged from the Southern Empress on the 5/6/1941 – 8 months at sea and his character report was listed as “very good”. His total wage for an 8-month voyage was £189.  Just one year later the Southern Empress was destroyed.  His address during this voyage is shown as 12 Llaingoch, Holyhead

His Merchant Navy contract shows the 1940-41 season was suspended most likely due to the war, but then he returned to the sea in 1944.  He signed on for the SS Gascony on the 8/5/1944 and for stayed with them until he retired from the Merchant Navy on 5/2/1951.  During these 11 years of Bob’s seafaring days, he had spent 7 christmases at sea. 

Taid moved his family  to live in Wrexham in 1942.  After he was finally discharged from the Navy and settled in Wrexham, he got a job in Monsanto’s Chemical Factory in Chirk.  Taid was one of the nicest people you could wish to meet.  He became a grandfather in 1948 (with me) at the age of 42.  I have  lots of strong memories of the influence he had in my life.  He would tease, hug and love me – and indeed all of the rest of his grandchildren.  Mam and Taid’s relatives  from Holyhead and Yorkshire, always told us that when they came to visit  Wrexham it was not only to see us all but because of the pure love and affection they felt for Bob.

He had a Shoe Last in his shed and spent many hours throughout the years mending all of our shoes.  I remember their home so very well.  It was always cosy, neat and clean.   It was a council house like ours but each room was so much bigger. They had two large living rooms and a large kitchen.  In their front room they had a square carpet in the middle of the room and all around it the floor was red with Cardinal Polish which Taid buffed up several times a week.  They had a Glass Cabinet which housed all their treasures including a Lego House which I made and they loved it so much that it went in pride of place in their cabinet. 

Mam had a part time job as a cleaner in Barclays Bank.  The problem was that she hardly ever did it.  I remember that Taid turned up to do her job at the end of his shift in Monsanto.  I even did it myself for a while in the late 1960s.  He was a hard working man who never complained, but Mam was definitely the boss in their relationship.  In 1962 Taid had a massive heart attack caused by extremely high cholesterol problems.  He was lucky and recovered but had to give up work.  It drove him mad.  He couldn’t drink, smoke or eat greasy food.  He used to go off roaming on his bicycle and eventually got a part-time job in the local turf accountants (we suspected that was where he went on his roaming days).  It helped a lot and kept him occupied.  However, one day everything just got a bit too much for him and he jumped onto his bicycle and never returned home.  My Dad went looking for him everywhere and finally found him the following day.  When I had my children in the late 1960’s I used to leave them with Mam and Taid and go and do their shopping for them.  Taid used to have a tin by his chair which was always filled with sweets for when we turned up.  Mam recalled him eating one of his sweets when he had his second and fatal heart attack in 1972. 

Major World Events in 1906 – the Year that Taid was born

• France –  An underground fire sparks a massive explosion that spreads through a series of mines killing over 1000 men in Courrieres, France.
• USA – International Morse code distress signal or SOS (· · · — — — · · ·) ( three dots, three dashes, three dots became the worldwide standard when it was included in the second International Radiotelegraphic Convention, in Berlin
• Italy – Vesuvius erupted on April 4th 1906, and its southern slope vented to about 1,200 meters. Its lava flow had stopped by the 5th, when a new effusion started on the Casa Fiorenza.
• USA – An earthquake, measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale, shook the town of San Francisco , California and Thirty thousand homes were either partially or wholly destroyed and an estimated 3,000 are reported dead.
• UK – February 7th – The Liberals won a landslide election victory in UK
• UK – June – A deputation representing half a million women went with a petition to 10 Downing Street to press women’s claim to the vote
• UK – Rolls Royce was founded