IT’S been very moving over the past few weeks to work alongside local actors and singers to put together the Remembrance concert which happened at the Borough Theatre this week.

Most of the words for the performance were drawn from the pages of the Chronicle and record not only the daily lives of those in the town during the First and Second World Wars, but also those of the soldiers who returned home or penned letters from the front.

Many of these are harrowing like the account of the brutal WWI fighting in France given by Gunner W R Davies - the first Abergavenny soldier to return to the town having been injured in action. With his injuries fresh and the trauma raw, he spoke about seeing his friends killed, the harsh conditions those who lived in the war zone endured and the agony and relief of being rescued from the battlefield and transported to a troop ship on a rattling train under constant bombardment.

Other tales were heartwarming like the story of the Llewellyn brothers, unexpectedly reunited in a foreign port, who were able to spend a few precious hours before being called back to action or devastating like the woman who lost her son and husband on the same day and was left with nowhere to mourn them.

Some captured a moment in the history of the town like the spontaneous - and possibly illegal - ringing of the bells of St Mary’s at the end of WWI and the ‘disorganised’ celebrations at the end of WWII which ended in tragedy when two young men were killed by an unexploded bomb on the hills about the town

In a time when rolling TV news coverage and social media were things of science fiction these snippets of information not only connected people with what was happening to their loved ones fighting a war miles away from home but also provided a snap shot into life in Abergavenny and how its resilient residents made the best of the worst of times.

Like so many my grandfather fought in Burma in the Second World War and while he never spoke of the years which left him with permanent injuries for the rest of his life, he also never missed the chance to pay tribute at the War Memorial on Remembrance Sunday, to those friends he had undoubtedly lost

We owe so much to those who have fought over the years, which is why it was so devastating to read the words of 100 year old veteran Alec Penstone, who this week said the sacrifice his generation made ‘wasn’t worth what the country has become’.

“What we fought for was our freedom, now it’s a darn sight worse than when I fought for it,” said Mr Penstone

“This country is so divided it just doesn’t seem to be a nice place any more and I blame the politicians - none of whom seem to have the backing of the people. It’s all self, self, self. What on earth has happened?” he asked.

Harsh words from someone with 100 years of life behind them…and a warning to us all to take a long hard look at where we’re headed.