V is for Verses: A-Z April Challenge 2020 :

V is for Verses - poems and songs that resonate with people and places in my family history. 

My great grandmother Maria Rawcliffe (1859-1919) was born in Hambleton one of the network of small villages north of the River Wyre, near Poulton-le-Fylde and Fleetwood, Lancashire.   In a local history publication, I came across this witty little verse referring to the different villages in the  area. I  like to think that Maria  was a "bonnie lass"!   

"Pilling for paters [potatoes]

Presall for pluck

Hamblton for bonnie lasses

Stalmine for much!"

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I am a Blackpudlian  born in the north west seaside  resort  of Blackpool, Lancashire, noted for its golden beaches and Tower, which was built in 1894, modelled on the Eiffel Tower in Paris.  It rises to 520 feet - facts drummed into us at school.   

 

Blackpool Tower  was the entertainment complex of its day, with its  Ballroom (where my parents met),  circus ring, aquarium and zoo. We used to go there about once a year as a treat.   

But the memory of the old Blackpool Zoo reminded me of a poem which we read at school "Albert and the Lion" by Mariot Edgar  which opens with the verses:

 

There's a famous seaside place called Blackpool

That's noted for fresh air and fun

nd Mr and Mrs Ramsbottom

Went there with young Albert, their son. 

 A grand little lad was young Albert,

All dressed in his best, quite a swell

With a stick with an'orse's 'ead 'andle, 

The finest Woolworth's could sell." 

                                       

The next 16 entertaining verses tell of a visit to the Zoo with disastrous consequences as young Albert encounters the lion.   

The most famous  recording of the poem, told in a broad Lancashire accent  is by music hall entertainer Stanley Holloway (he also played Eliza's  father in the classic film "My Fair lady" - with a Cockney accent).  

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My father in this 80's could still recite poems that he learned at school.  He enjoyed the dramatic tones of his favourites: The Border ballad "O young Lochinvar", "The "Charge of  the Light Brigade", "The Boy stood on the Burning Deck",  and  "The High Tide on the Coast of Lincolnshire".

"O young Lochinvar has come out of the west ,
Through out the wide Borders, his steed was the best.
And save his good broadsword, his weapons were none
He rode all unarmed and throde all alone
So faithful in lvoe and so dauntless in war
There never was knight like the young Lochinvar"

The first verse of the poem written by Borders writer Sir Walter Scott(1771-1832) and one of many Border Ballads that told tales of daring deeds and family feuds.  Scott  became fascinated with Borders history and Borders culture, culminating in the compilation and publication of his "Minstrelsy of the Scottish Borders",  a three-volume set of collected Scottish ballads,

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Dad was not to know that 50 years later I would be living in the Borders, initally in Hawick, Roxxburghshire where the focal point of the local calendar is the annual Common Riding.    It is both a symbolic riding of the town's boundaries, made in the past to safeguard burgh rights and also a commemoration of the callants, young lads of Hawick, who in 1514, raided a body of English troops  and captured their flag - the "banner blue".

                 The Cornet carrying "The Banner Blue" leads Hawick Common Riding
                            Photograph by Lesley Fraser, www.ilfimaging.co.uk


It is a time for local pride and passion when exiles return to their home town to renew friendships and join in the celebrations - in ceremonies and processions, picnics and horse-racing, and  in songs, ballads  and music, such as one of my favourites below:

"Where Slitrig dances doon the dell

To join the Teviot Water

There dwells auld Hawick's honest men

and Hawick's bright-eyed daughters."

The verse depicts the meeting of the two rivers in Hawick - the Slitrig and the much bigger Teviot.  (below)

                                                   

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Earlston in Berwickshire is now my home. a village  noted for being the birthplace of 13th century poet and prophet Thomas the Rhymer.  Ercildoune is its old name.  The Earlston song below was written by T. Graham. 

"There's a fine wee town in the Borders

It stands on the Leader's banks,

 Where its famed for thomas the Rhymer

It's the place  of his auld haunts. 

Where the banties cry in he mornin'

And the smell o'the whins and the broom,

st another gem of the Borders

And that gem is Ercildoune.

 You can sing your praise of the Highlands

Its lofty peaks are braw

but just let me gaze on the Black Hill

when you're round by Purveshaugh.

Let me stroll through Mellerstain entries

Or  don by Stan'in Stane

Earlstonians stand, be united,

And be proud to sing its name."

The ruins of Rhymer's Tower, reputed to be the home of Thomas the Rhymer

Craigsford Bridge, built c.1737,  over the Leader Water. 

The Black Hill, Earlston


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