Remarkable stories behind Pembrokeshire headstones will soon become available in book form, all thanks to the dedicated and painstaking research of a Pembroke man.

Owen Vaughan has spent thousands of hours in amassing a huge database of information on individuals with military connections who are buried in cemeteries up and down the county - and beyond. He has spent over a decade on this work and has photographed and deciphered the inscriptions on so many headstones.

Despite poor health, Owen has persevered with this unique and historically so important project and the first of his books will appear in the near future.

This will detail the people stories behind the headstones in Park Street Cemetery - the original cemetery of Pembroke Dock. Once long neglected and overgrown, the cemetery is now a park area and many headstones remain. The stories behind these headstones are now not forgotten, thanks to Owen.

The first book - entitled The Headstones and Memorials of Park Street - is currently with printers and will be followed next year by a book covering the Pembroke cemeteries of St. Mary's, St. Michael's and Monkton Priory.

Others in this unique series will include the Garrison Cemetery at Pembroke Dock - the only military cemetery in Wales - and the town's Llanion Cemetery. The Garrison book will contain information on men for whom headstones no longer survive.

Owen has donated a proof copy of the Garrison Cemetery book to the Pembroke Dock Heritage Centre and also wishes that his remarkable and very large database becomes part of the Heritage Centre's Archive.

Copies of the Park Street book will be sold for £13.99, but pre-publication copies are available at £10 from the Owen Vaughan Book Fund, c/o Meg Burrell, 29 Ocean Way, Pennar Point, Pembroke Dock. All proceeds support heritage organisations and the publication of the series.