The certificate was presented to my great grandmother, Mary Williams, in recognition of her many years' service as Nurse and Midwife in Bodfari and the surrounding areas.

She lived in Bodfari all her married life, with her husband John. They had one daughter, Jane, who was my grandmother.

My great grandmother raised my father, an only child who had been born out of wedlock, and he always referred to her as 'Mam'.

During her working life as a midwife she delivered hundreds of babies, and not one child was ever lost. Many times she gave her services free, as the families she went to were often very poor. She would take food for the family and clothes for the baby, paid for out of her own pocket.

On two separate occasions, after giving birth, the mothers, who were unmarried, decided they were unable to keep their babies. Both times my great grandmother adopted the babies, a boy named George and a girl named Florrie, and raised them as her own. My father, William Williams, regarded them as his brother and sister.

The family all lived at Tyn-y-Ffordd, Bodfari, a tiny two room cottage, which still stands today. In recent years it has been occupied by a local farm worker, and appears to have changed very little from my father's description of it all those years ago.

My father passed away three years ago, but his sister Florrie is still alive and well, living in Southampton.

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