CHRISTMAS GREETINGS FROM SCOTLAND

Community spirit is strong in my village of Earlston, (population around 1800), and  the Earlston Lights Group   does a sterling job in bringing a glow into our lives at Christmas time.

 

Santa Claus leads the procession for the switching on of the lights and then tours the village raising money for local charities.  

 

 

 

*********

Below the decorations in Princes Street Gardens some years ago. 

 

 

 ********

 

 AND FINALLY - A HAPPY & HEALTHY CHRISTMAS TO AL MY READERS 

 

 

          **********************

STAGECOACHES- ROMANCE V. REALITY

When we look at the pictures of stagecoaches on Christmas cards,   they look colourful, dashing and rather romantic, but what was the reality like for our ancestors traveling over 170 years ago?

 One of the many beautiful wall paintings you see on the outside of buildings in Austria.

Stagecoaches were public service vehicles designed specifically for passengers and running to a published schedule.  Eight passengers could be packed (squashed)  inside, with others sitting at the back of the coach and the poorest passengers atop along with the luggage. A newspaper report  of 1846 refers to a heavy coach of 18 to 20 passengers.  

ADVERTISEMENT   -Caledonian Mercury (Edinburgh) :  29th September 1843

NEW COACH EDINBURGH TO JEDBURGH VIA EARLSTON  
Calling at Pathhead, Carfrae Mill, Lauder, Earlston, Leaderfoot

 To Jedburgh in Five Hours
Fares to Jedburgh only 5 shillings outside;  6 shillings inside

 

Note:5 shillings is equivalent to  approx. £15 today.   The 5 hour journey  between Edinburgh and Jedburgh in the Scottish Borders covered 50 miles over what was a hilly road - as children we called it "the switchback road".

 

 A pub sign taken in Greenwich.  London. 

 

 

Contemporary newspaper reports of the time present a graphic picture of the perils facing passengers and  (and pedestrian) alike. 

 

 

"The Border Watch" - 19 November 1846: 

“A SLOW COACH. – The Edinburgh and Hawick coach, which left Princes Street, Edinburgh on Saturday afternoon at 4pm  did not reach the Bridge Inn, Galashiels, until about 10pm; thus accomplishing the distance of thirty-two miles in the astonishing period of six hours!   

 

 "The Kelso Chronicle" - 16 June 1837: 

"ACCIDENT. – On Tuesday evening  the reins broke, and the driver left his seat, and went along the pole to recover them. His foot slipped, and he fell between the pole and the horses to the ground. Fortunately, the wheels passed on both sides of him, and he escaped with no other injury than a slight blow to the head.The horses set off at rapid pace, and ran through Tweedmouth. The passengers kept their seats, and the horses while running furiously along the bridge, were stopped by a young man named Robert Robertson, who, with great personal risk, seized the horses’ head."

"The Kelso Chronicle" -  4 October 1844:

“WONDERFUL ESCAPE. – As the Defiance Coach was leaving the town on Friday last, a girl, about 10 years of age, who was hastily crossing the High Street, and not perceiving the coach, ran in betwixt the fore and hind horses, by which she was struck down, when the horses and coach went over her, to the horror of the spectators, who could do nothing to save her. The wheels on the one side passed over one of her legs, bruising it most severely in two places, while the opposite wheels went over the top of her bonnet, close to the head, but without doing any injury. The poor girl’s thigh was also much bruised, apparently by one of the horses’ feet. We are glad to state that she is recovering from the effects of her injuries.”

 

 

We were on holiday in Warsaw, when this stagecoach drove into the square. But we never managed to find out what it was all about. 

 

 

 

The development of the railways,  meant that by the mid 19th century,  the era of  stagecoach travel was coming to an end 

 

 

But the iconic image of the stagecoach as a mode of travel 

still captures our imagination. especially at Christmas time.  

 

  **************** 

LEST WE FORGET - A REMEMBRANCE DAY POST

War Memorials give no more than a name, yet they are one of the most powerful, poignant and emotive of family history resources, recording the loss of often young lives under harrowing circumstances. War Memorials are not only significant features for the family,  they also for the local community  bear witness to the sacrifice of their people in war. 

Here you will find war memorials from across Britain, ranging from simple crosses to the imposing national monument.

 

 

The simple but moving monument on the Isle of Iona off western Scotland, looks across the water to the Isle of Mull.

Comrades in arms on the war memorial  at Oban on the west coast of Scotland. It is in a most beautiful peaceful setting, with a background of sea and hills over the Isle of Mull - far removed from the horrors of war.

 

 The memorial in the small village of Taynuilt near Oban. 

 On the Isle of Arran.

 

 

 Another Scottish soldier portrayed on the war memorial at Aberfeldy, in Perthshire.

 

 

The Commando Memorial at Spean Bridge in the Scottish Highlands overlooks the training areas of the Commando Training Depot established in 1942 at Achnacarry Castle.

 

 From the Highlands of Scotland to the Scottish Borders

 

 

 

The imposing war memorial in  Hawick,   The setting is Wilton Lodge Park, a former 107 acre estate of the Pringle family, whose  home is now the town museum,  displaying illuminated rolls of honour of the war dead.   

 

                      The War Memorial in the small village of Minto, near Hawick 

 

 

 

Earlston War Memorial in the rural Scottish Borders, where I now live. 

To England

 

 A peaceful parkland setting for the war memorial in Clitheroe, Lancashire

 

Few families in the land could have escaped the impact of two World Wars, and my own was no exception.

The War Memorial in the Square at Poulton-le-Fylde, Lancashire,  home of my mother's Danson family,   with St. Chad's Church in the background.

My two great uncles  - George Danson, a stretcher bearer in the field, who was killed on the Somme in 1916  a week after his 22nd birthday, and widower John Danson who died in Army training in 1917, leaving his young daughter an orphan. 
. 

The reality of war faced by so many families is epitomized in these two   photograph of George' Danson's grave, the one on the left sent to his widowed mother Maria Danson.  It conveys in a stark way the  horrors of mud and blood that our ancestors must have experienced and contrasts with the pristine white of the more lasting memorials that we recognize today.   

 

Also remembering my paternal great uncle Arthur William Matthews of Wolverhampton, Staffordshire,  who died at Gallipoli in 1915,  leaving a widow and four young children.  Also Frederick Donaldson, my husbands great uncle,  killed on the Somme, in 1916,  the same day as George above,   and remembered on the Thiepval Monument in Picardy, France, dedicated  to men with no known grave.

 National Memorials

 The Battle of Britain Memorial on the Embankment in London

 

The Cenotaph, Britain's national memorial on Whitehall -  photograph taken on a visit to London in November shortly after Remembrance Day.

The Cenotaph began as a temporary structure erected for a peace parade following the end of the First World War  but following an outpouring of national sentiment,  it was replaced in 1920 by a permanent structure and designated the United Kingdom's primary national war memorial.

 

Designed by Edwin Lutyens and built of Portland Stone,  the memorial was unveiled by King  George V  on 11 November 1920, the second anniversary of the end of the war. The unveiling ceremony for the Cenotaph was part of a larger procession bringing the Unknown Solider to be laid to rest in his tomb in Westminster Abbey.

The term "Cenetaph" relates to a monument  to honour those who died,  whose bodies are buried elsewhere or have no known grave.

 

 Copyright © 2021 · Susan Donaldson.  All Rights Reserved

            ******************************

 

AUTUMN GOLD IN THE SCOTTISH BORDERS

This is the  first post of my new blog,  showcasing photographs taken by my husband,  daughter and  myself.   We live in Earlston, Berwickshire in the   Scottish Borders, an often forgotten region, south of Edinburgh, rich in beautiful landscape, history and heritage - all of which  will feature  in my posts - along with places much further afield. 

 AUTUMN  is my favourite season.

I love the colours of, brown, bronze, burgundy, green and gold.  Has this anything to do with the fact I was a "September" baby - as were my grandmother, mother, aunt, two uncles and husband?   These colours were staples in my wardrobe in the days when I was a brunette, and still feature  in my  home decor. 

I recall as a child:

• Scuffing my shoes through the leaves, and enjoying the crunchy sound - this still appeals to me!
  
  

• Collecting different coloured leaves to take home and make a picture.
  
  
  
  
  
• Gathering berries (hips, haws and rowan) to take into school for the nature table.
  
  
  
  
  
•   Gathering blackberries in the hedgerows and bilberries among the heather - and turning  our  lips purple as we sampled the fruit. 

•   Watching my mother turn the glut of apples, pears and plums into tarts, sponges, crumbles, jellies and jam.

• Singing harvest hymns at school and church  - among  my favourites  hymns with their rousing tunes and evocative lines "~We plough the fields and scatter",  "Come ye thankful people come, sing the song of harvest home", "To thee, O Lord our hearts we raise" , and of course "All things bright and beautiful "  where I especially liked  the image created by the verse: 

The purple-headed mountain,
The river running by,
The sunset and the morning,
That brightens up the sky;

 

 

Autumn also meant for me new beginnings – of a new school year, armed with a new pencil case or satchel, new shoes or uniform.  Later on it meant the sense of anticipation of a new university year in Edinburgh, riding on the top of the bus on a crisp morning, seeing the castle and the Royal Mile skyline rising above the trees changing colour in Princes Street Gardens.  

 

Now living in the Scottish Borders, the autumn gold colours can be magnificent - we just don't always get the clear  blue skies to show them off!     Autumn comes early, when there is a different smell to the  early morning air in late August.  The light in the sky changes and  mist hangs over the valleys.

 

Join me in an Autumn ramble  around Earlston  and places close by. 

 

 

I once read of someone who hated autumn because “everything was dying”.  I thought what a pity that she could not see the beauty in this time of year,    which to me is truly  epitomised by Keats’ classic poem  - I know it can be regarded as  a bit of a cliché, but it is so apt:

"A season of mist and mellow fruitfulness".

 

 

And TRUE AUTUMN GOLD 

         

 

 

 

All photographs taken in the Scottish Borders 

Copyright © 2021 · Susan Donaldson.  All Rights Reserved

 

 

*************