A long time ago, but yesterday too. Rain On My Window (Tears in My Eyes) will be an ongoing tale of my early memories of life shared by my younger brother David on Whitehall Farm in Stronsay, Orkney, of our childhood on a working farm in the 1930s before we lost our innocence.
No 58. Tackety Boots.
It was in an article back in May 2008 that I touched on the subject of “Tackety Boots”. Well worth another look. Of all the articles of clothing worn by the men in my early days, Tackety Boots was the most worthy of mention. And the most important. Every day and all day the farm men walked at their work, be it in the field with the horses or in the buildings looking after their cattle or the shepherd walking his sheep. A well fitting pair of tackety boots was an absolute necessity, there was no room for “nearlies” about it. Worn they may be, have seen their best days as many a pair had, but functional as only an old friend can be.
Every village had it’s shoemaker. In Castletown after we came to Caithness in 1944 it was John Gunn, in Stronsay it was, among others, Peter Lennie, but I do not know if Peter was a proper shoemaker as such, more of a very good man at repairs. A neat old man when I knew him, he was certainly a good carter for our father during the herring season and a carter in his own right for the whole Island. A warm house along the beach just west from Norton’s Pier, Maggie with the kettle always singing gently at the back of the fire, ready for an instant cup of tea. One of our father’s very regular stops.
I remember father getting a pair made for him by John Gunn after we came to Caithness. Took many days to make in between repairs of a more pressing nature for others.
The niceties of boot making are not in my memory except now and again watching some aspect of the shoemakers art. It all looked so easy, but a well made and well fitted pair was an exquisite bit of work. Left foot and right foot could vary a bit, the shoemaker carefully measuring each foot for a new customer. In most cases he just remembered.
Made of the best usually imported horse hide, thick and tough. Take a piece of leather, cut the separate parts out to a pattern, a few iron sprigs and tacks, toe and heel plates and a length of strong linen waxed twine. To make a pair of boots out of that was a miracle in itself. Slightly thinner tanned leather for the uppers, thicker leather for the soles and heels. Metal eyes for the long leather strip laces to run through. A thin leather loop tab at the top of the heel to facilitate pulling them on in the morning!! Every shoemaker had his own idea of the pattern of hobnails to be kept on the soles, out of sight no doubt but often identifiable as his hallmark. A final polish in black.
The boots today might well look odd, but do not believe your eyes. The curved soles, rising to the turned up toes. The uppers came well up the ankle giving good protection and support. The leather tongue was well sewn in, good enough to be watertight, quite important when walking through wet grass or puddles or pouring rain. Indeed the whole boot was watertight. They were definitely NOT town boots.
Simple tools, sharp knife, patterns, a cobblers last of which he would have many sizes, an awl to drill the holes, a tap hammer, a strong needle to pass the thread, indeed two at a time sewing double, which is one thread each way. And that wonderful smell of new leather always around which today’s plastic cannot copy. . A pair would last for so long, looked after and treasured by the men.
The new boots would be admired for a time, then the process of looking after them for many years ahead. A tin of waterproof dubbin, warm the boots at the fire and rub in a layer both on the uppers and the soles. Hard work too, especially on the seams. The long leather laces would be dubbined and run through the hand. Leave a few days to absorb the dubbin, then another coat. Sometimes a gentle warming with a blow lamp turned well down, a near singeing perhaps, just enough to warm the leather. Helped the dubbin to soak in. Sometimes warm a spoon at the fire, handle held in a bit of rag, and smooth the back of the spoon on the leather for a final polish. An Army trick too. The new boots would be put on by the worker for the evening, going nowhere but getting them gently broken in, getting to know each other. Sometimes a gentle joke or two about wearing them in bed. Maybe they did !!!
Most if not every house had a shoe-last in the shed, taken into the kitchen in front of the fire to work on a pair of boots. I can never forget seeing Sincy Shearer our Whitehall foreman with the shoe last stood on the floor and supported between his knees, a tackety boot on it, his specks on his nose, a few hobnails or tacks kept handily ready between his lips, the tap tap as he hammered them home. Why the name “hobnails” I do not know, it must go back in history a long time. Clover leaf head and just so long that they did not penetrate the soles. Spare heel and toe plates as well.
Keeping Tackety Boots healthy was an every day task. Running repairs normally were to check on the toe and heel plates to see if they were firmly nailed on, any loose or missing nails being instantly replaced from the precious tack tin. A lost toe or heel plate had to be replaced right away, or a worn one as soon as possible.
The clover leaf headed tacks or hob nails set in their regulation pattern along the soles and heels of the boots were likeways taken care of. The boots really walked on iron, the men walking behind the horses shod also with their own iron horseshoes. When one thinks on it, leather however good could not stand up to the constant walking of farm work. Hence tackety boots.
Consider that the horsemen walked mile after long mile every day all year round following their horses. To plough an acre was a good days work with a pair of horses and a 7 inch wide furrow plough. That meant 15 miles of walking for one acre. Allow for going out to the field and home again twice in the day, going round the ends between bouts, and you are pretty near to twenty miles, Wick to Thurso in a straight line. EVERY DAY SAVE SUNDAY. All on tackety boots.
Holding the stilts of the plough and keeping the line of a straight furrow, looking after your horses though a well trained pair were pretty good themselves at keeping the furrow, and you will recognise why there were very few over-weight ploughmen in old photographs. I remember none at all.
Or the shepherd herding his sheep, the cattleman walking up and down the byres. No farm work was done sitting on ones **** as now we do. Boots were the foundation of their day. Tackety boots.
Looking after boots, new or old, was very important. Last thing at night after work was to clean them, wash if need be at the tap or sink or pond using a wisp of straw or a bit of an old sack, dry well at the fire but not too near. On a fine evening set them out on the window ledge or at the back door to dry. I remember one tragedy when a pair were set just too close to the fire, did not do the leather much good. Then a rub with dubbin, especially into the sewn seams. Black boot polish was sometimes used for that final shine. Dubbin was a khaki coloured wax like thick vaseline but could be bought black dyed already.
Tackety boots were every day and all day wear for farm work. Normally the men would have a good pair of lighter boots for Sunday and social events. The tackety boots may have looked odd with their upward curved toes but don’t you believe they were clumsy. Stronsay went to neighbouring Sanday for a football match, the complement (COMPLIMENT ) returned in due course. Tackety Boots did the job just as well as the super brands you see over-advertised today. Trousers tucked into socks, shirt sleeves rolled up, trousers held in place by suspender braces and an Army Surplus belt from the Army and Navy Stores. The men were as good as you could get, some very pretty players indeed. Sanday usually won.
Long years later after I went to Lower Dounreay and looking at old records, I found that the farms of Lower Dounreay and Upper Dounreay had enough men on each farm pre First World War to each form a team, perhaps not eleven men but enough. They played one farm against the other, needle matches. Tackety boots at their best no doubt!!
Friday, 30 October 2009
Wednesday, 28 October 2009
THE VIKING BATTLE OF RAUDABJORG, 1045 A.D.
The Battle of Raudabjorg, 1045 A.D.,
Between Earl Thorfinn the Mighty
and his nephew Earl Rognavald Brusison.
“The Battle of Raudabjorg”, an article by Dan Mackay, was featured in the Caithness Courier of 12th August 2009. This was of particular interest to me as Castlehill Heritage Centre have been engaged since June 2008 in their Viking Heritage Project. This relates particularly to the Dunnet Area, with six weeks of field work undertaken beginning in July of that year and ending in August. Much digging was done, many samples and cores taken by a group of enthusiastic amateur archaeologist volunteers. This work was done over the Links of Dunnet by kind permission of George Campbell of Thurdistoft and Hamish Pottinger of Greenland Mains, and of Jimmy Swanson just North of the Dunnet Forest. We still await the final analysis of the samples, which can take some time.
My own contribution towards this project was to look again for clues in the Orkneyinga Saga. This had been required school reading in Stronsay with my headmaster John Drever, and on which we had to do a Bursary Competition. There have been many translations of the Saga, written originally allegedly in Iceland circa 1200 AD, translations in Latin by Torfeus in Norway, by Rev. Alexander Pope, Minister of Reay, who translated and transcribed the Latin of Torfeus. A signed copy of Pope’s work is in the Archives in Wick Library, inscribed 1774 by Pope to his friend Thomas Pennant. Other translators were Anderson in the late 1800s and Professor Pallson, Penguin Classics 1993 edition. There have been others. The late Jack Saxon in 1974 had a wide ranging article on the Battle of Raudabjorg in Caithness Field Club transactions, still attainable through Caithness.Org, and well argued.
What Dan Mackay and all the others overlooked was the furious tidal vicissitudes of the Pentland Firth. That same Pentland Firth was the same waters crossed by one of my double great great grandfathers, James Tait, eventually tenant of Inkstack from 28th May 1843 till his death in 1854. He and three of his sons, William of Quanterness, John of Campston and James of Inkstack, crossed the Pentland Firth many times with cattle bought in Orkney. One well documented trip was with 240 cattle bought in the North Isles and carried in 18 North Isles boats at 12 cattle per boat, by sail and by oars when needed. They set off from Carness near and North of Kirkwall, rounded Mull Head in Deerness, came into Scapa Flow at St Marys in Holm only to find the weather had turned nasty for the Pentland Firth crossing. So they went into the shelter of Longhope, the old Viking harbour of refuge called Asmundasvagr, and there they waited a week for better weather. Setting off again, the weather once more turned nasty. Nine boats carried on and got through, nine turned back and waited another week before a successful crossing. The cattle were then driven, first to Grotistoft in the Hill of Barrock, then, after shoeing their cloven hooves, the long walk or trek to Carlisle to Mr Thomas Morton of Brough on the Solway Firth. Took nearly four weeks droving, hard work for hard men.
Morton, classed in the Census of 1841 as a husbandman, was in Alterwall in Lyth on 15th April 1815 for the christening of Janet, daughter of James Tait and Elizabeth Nicolson then living there. James Tait was Morton’s local agent in the North for buying cattle, in this instance from Orkney. Morton being in Alterwall for the christening was fortuitous, his trip North was to see James Tait as to buying cattle that coming season, taking money North to pay for the beasts, cash on the nail when delivered by local boats to Carness.
So too with Earl Rognavald in his attempt in 1045 A.D. to defeat his uncle Earl Thorfinn the Mighty. Castlehill Heritage hope to publish later in the year a fuller version of research and views, but space requires this to be reasonably brief. Suffice that they are all out of step with “Oor Jock”, i.e. - myself. They are looking in all the silliest places for the location of the Battle, a classic example of “Hunt the Thimble”. The only place the Battle of Raudabjorg could have taken place was out of the ferocious tides of the Pentland Firth and on the quiet sea under Dwarwick Head in Dunnet Bay. It took place just off the Red Broch of Dunnet, (O.N. Raudabjorg), still there in attenuated form 120 metres to the East of the Salmon Bothy, with a triangulation point in its centre from the first Ordnance Survey of 1873. It was built with red stone taken off the beach, fallen from the red cliffs of Dwarwick Head and driven along the grey bedrock of the shore to lie conveniently below the Broch site. Hence the name Raudabjorg – Red Broch - a Norse name for a structure built by the Picts a thousand years before the Vikings arrived in Caithness.
The Old Norse did not call a cliff “bjorg”. Witness the Orkneyinga Saga the broch called Moseybjorg in Shetland, the Broch of Mousa. We do not need to conjecture that it was off Ratter, off the Kirk o’ Tang, off the mythical Roberry Head of Pallson in South Walls in Hoy which does not even exist. Look at the Map of Hoy if you doubt me. It was quite impossible for Viking Longships to sail against the wind, or to buck the violent opposing tides of the Pentland Firth, slender wooden craft driven by sail and if need be by oars
Grappled side to side, sails down and stored out of the way, oars useless, the ships could only fight in sheltered waters such as a sea loch like Loch Vatn in Ireland, or the Menai Straights between Anglesey and Wales, or a Norwegian Fyord such as the Battle of Solvidor.
Perhaps more interesting in the time of the Battle of Raudabjorg was the Norse influence over all of Britain. Raudabjorg was a local sea Battle between Earl Thorfinn Sigurdson the Mighty and his nephew Earl Rognavald, son of his brother Brusi.
A few years later in 1066 A.D. the Norse and Danes under Harold Hardrada invaded England by way of the Orkneys and landed at Riccall near York with a force probably numbering about 10,000 men. They were badly defeated at the Battle of Stamford Bridge on 25th September 1066 by King Harold Godwinson of England. After that Battle two of Thorfinn’s sons, Earls Paul and Erland, were allowed to return to Orkney with the surviving Vikings and the attenuated remnants of the Viking Fleet.
Harold Godwinson immediately marched South to oppose William, Duke of Normandy, a direct descendant of Hrolf the Ganger of Norway, renamed Rollo, Duke of Normandy, after having Normandy ceded to him by the French Monarch. Hrolf was the oldest brother of the bastard youngest brother Torf Einar who conquered Orkney, and is reputed to have taught the Islanders to cut peats, or turf. Believe the peat story as you wish.
They met at the Battle of Hastings, too well known to require mention.
It has been suggested that if Harold had first met Duke William at Hastings before his Army was decimated at the Battle of Stamford Bridge, Harold would have defeated William. It was a close call anyway. Then a subsequent defeat of Harold at Stamford Bridge might well have ended in the Throne of England being held by a Viking Earl from Orkney. Another suggestion is that the two armies knew of each others attack on England, that the cunning Duke William allowed Stamford Bridge to take place first, giving him the main chance which he took.
So who in the tangled web of History is to tell that the Battle of Raudabjorg, fought just under the red rock shelter of Dwarwick Head, did not have some influence in the Monarchy of England.
Between Earl Thorfinn the Mighty
and his nephew Earl Rognavald Brusison.
“The Battle of Raudabjorg”, an article by Dan Mackay, was featured in the Caithness Courier of 12th August 2009. This was of particular interest to me as Castlehill Heritage Centre have been engaged since June 2008 in their Viking Heritage Project. This relates particularly to the Dunnet Area, with six weeks of field work undertaken beginning in July of that year and ending in August. Much digging was done, many samples and cores taken by a group of enthusiastic amateur archaeologist volunteers. This work was done over the Links of Dunnet by kind permission of George Campbell of Thurdistoft and Hamish Pottinger of Greenland Mains, and of Jimmy Swanson just North of the Dunnet Forest. We still await the final analysis of the samples, which can take some time.
My own contribution towards this project was to look again for clues in the Orkneyinga Saga. This had been required school reading in Stronsay with my headmaster John Drever, and on which we had to do a Bursary Competition. There have been many translations of the Saga, written originally allegedly in Iceland circa 1200 AD, translations in Latin by Torfeus in Norway, by Rev. Alexander Pope, Minister of Reay, who translated and transcribed the Latin of Torfeus. A signed copy of Pope’s work is in the Archives in Wick Library, inscribed 1774 by Pope to his friend Thomas Pennant. Other translators were Anderson in the late 1800s and Professor Pallson, Penguin Classics 1993 edition. There have been others. The late Jack Saxon in 1974 had a wide ranging article on the Battle of Raudabjorg in Caithness Field Club transactions, still attainable through Caithness.Org, and well argued.
What Dan Mackay and all the others overlooked was the furious tidal vicissitudes of the Pentland Firth. That same Pentland Firth was the same waters crossed by one of my double great great grandfathers, James Tait, eventually tenant of Inkstack from 28th May 1843 till his death in 1854. He and three of his sons, William of Quanterness, John of Campston and James of Inkstack, crossed the Pentland Firth many times with cattle bought in Orkney. One well documented trip was with 240 cattle bought in the North Isles and carried in 18 North Isles boats at 12 cattle per boat, by sail and by oars when needed. They set off from Carness near and North of Kirkwall, rounded Mull Head in Deerness, came into Scapa Flow at St Marys in Holm only to find the weather had turned nasty for the Pentland Firth crossing. So they went into the shelter of Longhope, the old Viking harbour of refuge called Asmundasvagr, and there they waited a week for better weather. Setting off again, the weather once more turned nasty. Nine boats carried on and got through, nine turned back and waited another week before a successful crossing. The cattle were then driven, first to Grotistoft in the Hill of Barrock, then, after shoeing their cloven hooves, the long walk or trek to Carlisle to Mr Thomas Morton of Brough on the Solway Firth. Took nearly four weeks droving, hard work for hard men.
Morton, classed in the Census of 1841 as a husbandman, was in Alterwall in Lyth on 15th April 1815 for the christening of Janet, daughter of James Tait and Elizabeth Nicolson then living there. James Tait was Morton’s local agent in the North for buying cattle, in this instance from Orkney. Morton being in Alterwall for the christening was fortuitous, his trip North was to see James Tait as to buying cattle that coming season, taking money North to pay for the beasts, cash on the nail when delivered by local boats to Carness.
So too with Earl Rognavald in his attempt in 1045 A.D. to defeat his uncle Earl Thorfinn the Mighty. Castlehill Heritage hope to publish later in the year a fuller version of research and views, but space requires this to be reasonably brief. Suffice that they are all out of step with “Oor Jock”, i.e. - myself. They are looking in all the silliest places for the location of the Battle, a classic example of “Hunt the Thimble”. The only place the Battle of Raudabjorg could have taken place was out of the ferocious tides of the Pentland Firth and on the quiet sea under Dwarwick Head in Dunnet Bay. It took place just off the Red Broch of Dunnet, (O.N. Raudabjorg), still there in attenuated form 120 metres to the East of the Salmon Bothy, with a triangulation point in its centre from the first Ordnance Survey of 1873. It was built with red stone taken off the beach, fallen from the red cliffs of Dwarwick Head and driven along the grey bedrock of the shore to lie conveniently below the Broch site. Hence the name Raudabjorg – Red Broch - a Norse name for a structure built by the Picts a thousand years before the Vikings arrived in Caithness.
The Old Norse did not call a cliff “bjorg”. Witness the Orkneyinga Saga the broch called Moseybjorg in Shetland, the Broch of Mousa. We do not need to conjecture that it was off Ratter, off the Kirk o’ Tang, off the mythical Roberry Head of Pallson in South Walls in Hoy which does not even exist. Look at the Map of Hoy if you doubt me. It was quite impossible for Viking Longships to sail against the wind, or to buck the violent opposing tides of the Pentland Firth, slender wooden craft driven by sail and if need be by oars
Grappled side to side, sails down and stored out of the way, oars useless, the ships could only fight in sheltered waters such as a sea loch like Loch Vatn in Ireland, or the Menai Straights between Anglesey and Wales, or a Norwegian Fyord such as the Battle of Solvidor.
Perhaps more interesting in the time of the Battle of Raudabjorg was the Norse influence over all of Britain. Raudabjorg was a local sea Battle between Earl Thorfinn Sigurdson the Mighty and his nephew Earl Rognavald, son of his brother Brusi.
A few years later in 1066 A.D. the Norse and Danes under Harold Hardrada invaded England by way of the Orkneys and landed at Riccall near York with a force probably numbering about 10,000 men. They were badly defeated at the Battle of Stamford Bridge on 25th September 1066 by King Harold Godwinson of England. After that Battle two of Thorfinn’s sons, Earls Paul and Erland, were allowed to return to Orkney with the surviving Vikings and the attenuated remnants of the Viking Fleet.
Harold Godwinson immediately marched South to oppose William, Duke of Normandy, a direct descendant of Hrolf the Ganger of Norway, renamed Rollo, Duke of Normandy, after having Normandy ceded to him by the French Monarch. Hrolf was the oldest brother of the bastard youngest brother Torf Einar who conquered Orkney, and is reputed to have taught the Islanders to cut peats, or turf. Believe the peat story as you wish.
They met at the Battle of Hastings, too well known to require mention.
It has been suggested that if Harold had first met Duke William at Hastings before his Army was decimated at the Battle of Stamford Bridge, Harold would have defeated William. It was a close call anyway. Then a subsequent defeat of Harold at Stamford Bridge might well have ended in the Throne of England being held by a Viking Earl from Orkney. Another suggestion is that the two armies knew of each others attack on England, that the cunning Duke William allowed Stamford Bridge to take place first, giving him the main chance which he took.
So who in the tangled web of History is to tell that the Battle of Raudabjorg, fought just under the red rock shelter of Dwarwick Head, did not have some influence in the Monarchy of England.
No 57. Summer Days.
A long time ago, but yesterday too. Rain On My Window (Tears in My Eyes) will be an ongoing tale of my early memories of life shared by my younger brother David on Whitehall Farm in Stronsay, Orkney, of our childhood on a working farm in the 1930s before we lost our innocence.
As we sink through Autumn into Winter I think of that old song “Summer Days are here again”. How is it that so many people tell us how good the summers were when they were young? The sun always shone, the larks sang, the water was warm. And so it was, because our memories seem to blot out the storms and the cold days, well, almost.
Summer brought out the flies, birds nesting, rabbits doing what rabbits do best. Bluebottles buzzing around the stone dykes, a spider’s web catching one and a different buzzing, higher pitched, as if a bluebottle suffered from terror, which I am sure it did. As well it might with a hungry spider coming. We watched with childhood fascination the process of nature, this small spider fastening onto the big bluebottle that soon stopped his struggles, anaesthetized and spun into a web cocoon of silk to later become a spider’s dinner. In a few days we came back to the spider’s web to see the shriveled shell of our bluebottle, its substance sucked out. We did better than that. We caught a bluebottle against a windowpane in the house and took it to the spider, cruelly popping it onto the web and watching to see the tiny hidden spider appear in response to the fly’s struggles, a message telegraphed along the slender filaments to its hidden nest. This David and Goliath struggle interested us greatly, and just sometimes the Bluebottle managed to break free, but not often. Smaller flies of course were caught too, but the Bluebottle was our delight.
The Cabbage White Butterfly featured in our Biology. Cursed by all gardeners and by farmers trying to grow cabbages in the field in the vegetable rows, the Cabbage White was Stronsay’s all too prolific butterfly. We saw a Red Admiral now and again but were not too well placed for the multiplicity of butterflies found further south.
At home we would find a chrysalis hidden in an outside corner of a wooden window frame, well camouflaged in mottled grey-green, safely cocooned and attached by slender but strong threads of silk against all the buffetings of winter storms. Gently prise it from its attachment and put it in a jam jar with a lid on it. Then wait for Spring, vaguely seeing the slow metamorphosis of the caterpillar into a butterfly through the thin skin of the chrysalis, a frequent if not every day look to see how it was getting on.
This was done at School too, our teacher asking for anyone who found a chrysalis to take it with us. Not too many to reach the number she wanted, but several to put in jam jars and watch with care. As summer approached we watched with great attention to see the first sign of the chrysalis splitting along the back and the wet new butterfly emerge stage by stage. Wings at first hardly discernable, lying flat along the slim body, but slowly they stretched and filled and became the hallmark white wings of the Cabbage White. Then we let it fly away, no doubt to find a cabbage to start all over again. Presumably it had to find a mate, and often we saw a couple locked rather too close together, mighty suspicious.
Our lesson with the Butterfly was not yet over. Now and again a chrysalis did not produce a butterfly. Instead it produced a small tiny creature leaving the empty shell. The Ichneumon Fly had beaten us. This predatory fly, or wasp as it is sometimes called, lays its eggs in a suitable caterpillar before it turns into a chrysalis, carrying the seeds of its own destruction. So over the winter the fly grub slowly eats its way through its host, the original oven-ready meal. Such is nature.
Next on our list of home made Biology was to find a rabbit’s nest. Not the proverbial burrow but the short shallow burrow a female rabbit makes to have her young, solitary and away from the warren. Not easy to find, the entrance covered over and well hidden by the mother when she leaves the nest to eat. Inside at arms length by about three feet was her nest, lined with downy fur and soft as soft is. Nestled in that would be about six or seven warm little rabbits. If we found one soon enough their eyes would not even be open. The mother rabbit - doe if you wish - did not stay long with the young, just enough time to suckle them and them off again with the nest once more safely camouflaged. There was no need to stay to keep the little ones warm, the soft fur-lined nest took care of that. We seldom ever found a nest with the doe inside, indeed I cannot recall even one. Later as the young rabbits grew the nest burrow was no longer filled in and the little ones ventured outside their home, but quick as a flash to get back in at the approach of anything.
There was the joy of turning over a flat stone, to see the forkytails and the earwigs and the cockroaches hidden there. The forkytails would small-jump their way out of sight. I think the earwigs name and reputation made us fear they would get into our ears and burrow into our tiny brains. An old wives tale, but we believed it. Evil looking things.
Centipedes too. We never were able to verify the leg count. They too could move fast, an odd scurrying twisting gait. There were other little denizens but the above were the main ones. There were small clumps of whitish eggs, what they were I do not know. Occasionally we found an earthworm sheltered there. Had a competition to find the largest one.
Birds were in their majesty. Blackbirds singing, a thrush in wonderful song in a white rose bush which grew in the garden, music I can still in memory hear, the mavis of Robert Burns. ( and his wonderful song ):-
I have heard the mavis singing,
His love song to the morn,
I have seen the dew drop clinging,
To the rose just newly born.
But a sweeter song has cheer'd me,
At the ev'ning's gentle close,
And I've seen an eye still brighter,
Than the dew drop on the rose.
'Twas thy voice, my gentle Mary,
And thine artless winning smile,
That made this world an Eden,
Bonnie Mary of Argyll.
( Karen - if above lines included might stop here )
Tho' thy voice may lose its sweetness,
And thine eye its brightness too,
Tho' thy step may lack its fleetness,
And thy hair its sunny hue.
Still to me wilt thou be dearer,
Than all the world shall own,
I have loved thee for thy beauty,
But not for that alone.
I have watched thy heart, dear Mary,
And its goodness was the wile,
That has made thee mine for ever,
Bonnie Mary of Argyll.
So many of our birds today seem so greatly reduced in numbers. Except last summer. Sharon and I went to my native Stronsay and up to Rousam Head, farmed by ourselves from 1893 to 1913. On the heather covered moor there were three wind turbines, erected quite some years ago. The area had been reseeded years ago under a Government scheme so the heather was now cleared in places, replaced with grass clumps, circular patches of white clover in wonderful scented blossom, some bare earth. The day was warm, the sky was blue, no wind, just like old times. On the ground were many small coveys of young lapwings, tiny mottled scurrying chicks herded by their mother. Lapwings have not more than four each, but some had gathered together and several mothers had a clutch of chicks shared. So many in one place took us quite by surprise. And above us sang so many larks, a heavenly chorus. The acoustics were superb. It was an effort of will for us to leave that magic spot.
We went down to the old farmhouse of the Bu’ where our father had spent his youth and into the kitchen. Sat over coffee with Ian Stevenson at the old kitchen table where a long time ago our Uncle John, while still a medical student, in an emergency, successfully took out the appendix of his brother our Uncle Bill. We talked with Ian of the larks and the tee-icks up on Rousam Head. He told us they were so plentiful because all the predatory birds, blackbacks, hoodie crows, ravens, skuas, hawks, peregrine falcons, shy away from the slowly moving turbine blades and underneath them was a haven for these tiny birds who flourished in the safety. I have read of the same phenonomen elsewhere, and wondered.
As we sink through Autumn into Winter I think of that old song “Summer Days are here again”. How is it that so many people tell us how good the summers were when they were young? The sun always shone, the larks sang, the water was warm. And so it was, because our memories seem to blot out the storms and the cold days, well, almost.
Summer brought out the flies, birds nesting, rabbits doing what rabbits do best. Bluebottles buzzing around the stone dykes, a spider’s web catching one and a different buzzing, higher pitched, as if a bluebottle suffered from terror, which I am sure it did. As well it might with a hungry spider coming. We watched with childhood fascination the process of nature, this small spider fastening onto the big bluebottle that soon stopped his struggles, anaesthetized and spun into a web cocoon of silk to later become a spider’s dinner. In a few days we came back to the spider’s web to see the shriveled shell of our bluebottle, its substance sucked out. We did better than that. We caught a bluebottle against a windowpane in the house and took it to the spider, cruelly popping it onto the web and watching to see the tiny hidden spider appear in response to the fly’s struggles, a message telegraphed along the slender filaments to its hidden nest. This David and Goliath struggle interested us greatly, and just sometimes the Bluebottle managed to break free, but not often. Smaller flies of course were caught too, but the Bluebottle was our delight.
The Cabbage White Butterfly featured in our Biology. Cursed by all gardeners and by farmers trying to grow cabbages in the field in the vegetable rows, the Cabbage White was Stronsay’s all too prolific butterfly. We saw a Red Admiral now and again but were not too well placed for the multiplicity of butterflies found further south.
At home we would find a chrysalis hidden in an outside corner of a wooden window frame, well camouflaged in mottled grey-green, safely cocooned and attached by slender but strong threads of silk against all the buffetings of winter storms. Gently prise it from its attachment and put it in a jam jar with a lid on it. Then wait for Spring, vaguely seeing the slow metamorphosis of the caterpillar into a butterfly through the thin skin of the chrysalis, a frequent if not every day look to see how it was getting on.
This was done at School too, our teacher asking for anyone who found a chrysalis to take it with us. Not too many to reach the number she wanted, but several to put in jam jars and watch with care. As summer approached we watched with great attention to see the first sign of the chrysalis splitting along the back and the wet new butterfly emerge stage by stage. Wings at first hardly discernable, lying flat along the slim body, but slowly they stretched and filled and became the hallmark white wings of the Cabbage White. Then we let it fly away, no doubt to find a cabbage to start all over again. Presumably it had to find a mate, and often we saw a couple locked rather too close together, mighty suspicious.
Our lesson with the Butterfly was not yet over. Now and again a chrysalis did not produce a butterfly. Instead it produced a small tiny creature leaving the empty shell. The Ichneumon Fly had beaten us. This predatory fly, or wasp as it is sometimes called, lays its eggs in a suitable caterpillar before it turns into a chrysalis, carrying the seeds of its own destruction. So over the winter the fly grub slowly eats its way through its host, the original oven-ready meal. Such is nature.
Next on our list of home made Biology was to find a rabbit’s nest. Not the proverbial burrow but the short shallow burrow a female rabbit makes to have her young, solitary and away from the warren. Not easy to find, the entrance covered over and well hidden by the mother when she leaves the nest to eat. Inside at arms length by about three feet was her nest, lined with downy fur and soft as soft is. Nestled in that would be about six or seven warm little rabbits. If we found one soon enough their eyes would not even be open. The mother rabbit - doe if you wish - did not stay long with the young, just enough time to suckle them and them off again with the nest once more safely camouflaged. There was no need to stay to keep the little ones warm, the soft fur-lined nest took care of that. We seldom ever found a nest with the doe inside, indeed I cannot recall even one. Later as the young rabbits grew the nest burrow was no longer filled in and the little ones ventured outside their home, but quick as a flash to get back in at the approach of anything.
There was the joy of turning over a flat stone, to see the forkytails and the earwigs and the cockroaches hidden there. The forkytails would small-jump their way out of sight. I think the earwigs name and reputation made us fear they would get into our ears and burrow into our tiny brains. An old wives tale, but we believed it. Evil looking things.
Centipedes too. We never were able to verify the leg count. They too could move fast, an odd scurrying twisting gait. There were other little denizens but the above were the main ones. There were small clumps of whitish eggs, what they were I do not know. Occasionally we found an earthworm sheltered there. Had a competition to find the largest one.
Birds were in their majesty. Blackbirds singing, a thrush in wonderful song in a white rose bush which grew in the garden, music I can still in memory hear, the mavis of Robert Burns. ( and his wonderful song ):-
I have heard the mavis singing,
His love song to the morn,
I have seen the dew drop clinging,
To the rose just newly born.
But a sweeter song has cheer'd me,
At the ev'ning's gentle close,
And I've seen an eye still brighter,
Than the dew drop on the rose.
'Twas thy voice, my gentle Mary,
And thine artless winning smile,
That made this world an Eden,
Bonnie Mary of Argyll.
( Karen - if above lines included might stop here )
Tho' thy voice may lose its sweetness,
And thine eye its brightness too,
Tho' thy step may lack its fleetness,
And thy hair its sunny hue.
Still to me wilt thou be dearer,
Than all the world shall own,
I have loved thee for thy beauty,
But not for that alone.
I have watched thy heart, dear Mary,
And its goodness was the wile,
That has made thee mine for ever,
Bonnie Mary of Argyll.
So many of our birds today seem so greatly reduced in numbers. Except last summer. Sharon and I went to my native Stronsay and up to Rousam Head, farmed by ourselves from 1893 to 1913. On the heather covered moor there were three wind turbines, erected quite some years ago. The area had been reseeded years ago under a Government scheme so the heather was now cleared in places, replaced with grass clumps, circular patches of white clover in wonderful scented blossom, some bare earth. The day was warm, the sky was blue, no wind, just like old times. On the ground were many small coveys of young lapwings, tiny mottled scurrying chicks herded by their mother. Lapwings have not more than four each, but some had gathered together and several mothers had a clutch of chicks shared. So many in one place took us quite by surprise. And above us sang so many larks, a heavenly chorus. The acoustics were superb. It was an effort of will for us to leave that magic spot.
We went down to the old farmhouse of the Bu’ where our father had spent his youth and into the kitchen. Sat over coffee with Ian Stevenson at the old kitchen table where a long time ago our Uncle John, while still a medical student, in an emergency, successfully took out the appendix of his brother our Uncle Bill. We talked with Ian of the larks and the tee-icks up on Rousam Head. He told us they were so plentiful because all the predatory birds, blackbacks, hoodie crows, ravens, skuas, hawks, peregrine falcons, shy away from the slowly moving turbine blades and underneath them was a haven for these tiny birds who flourished in the safety. I have read of the same phenonomen elsewhere, and wondered.
Friday, 2 October 2009
No 42. Wartime, or Dad's Army.
A long time ago, but yesterday too. Rain On My Window (Tears in My Eyes) will be an ongoing tale of my early memories of life shared by my younger brother David on Whitehall Farm in Stronsay, Orkney, of our childhood on a working farm in the 1930s before we lost our innocence.
ALL OUR YESTERDAYS is a phrase which rings in my ears. Someone recently mentioned the War – 1939 to 1945 – an American oddly enough in Forss House one evening - and he asked how we then lived, what was rationing like, did we go hungry. Hauled me back in time a good bit but made me think of those far off days for most of which we were in Stronsay. Then from May 1944 in Caithness. Allowing for a child not remembering the first few years of life, there are few now alive other than pensioners, and not all of them either, who has memory of those perilous days.
On Stronsay, a quiet backwater in so many ways, we had visible enough signs of War. First I remember was being issued with identity cards and gas masks at every house just before War was declared. We bairns had to take them with us to school and be instructed how to put them on properly. Smell of new grey rubber and French chalk and making rude noises by blowing too fiercely. For a time we were obliged to carry them but that drill did not last too long.
Near the Central School in the middle of the island and on our way to school a Communications Wireless Station had been erected, webs of masts and wires and insulators, with a building for the generator and working space for the operators. The station was in line of sight from Sanday to the North with its Radar Station and the Mainland to the South, making a link between them. When we passed there was usually the song of the wind sighing and soughing through the wires and an electrical crackle and fizzle and pop as well. When the Radar Station was erected on Sanday to our North the four huge masts were seen well enough from Stronsay. A young man from Stronsay fell to his death there while working on their erection. Another Stronsay lad was sent down the coalmines as a Bevin Boy, as they called them, and lost his life there. I remember his sad funereal. These things hit a small island hard.
The LDV (Local Defense Volunteers) were formed in 1940, then renamed The Home Guard. We called them “Dad’s Army” long before T.V. pinched our title!! Our father [ Dad ] was the Sergeant. He had First World War experience in the Seaforths but never went to France, or I guess we would not be here now. At the outbreak of War in August 1914 he, like so many others, was in the Territorial Army and was mobilized at the very beginning. He never did speak much about that time in his life, too many good friends never came home. He spent the time he was in the Army hauling defence guns up the sheer cliffs of the Barrel of Butter, a monstrously steep rock in Scapa Flow, put in some time at Fort George, was sent out to Stronsay to mount guard with two other Terriers on Rousam Head in a small watch hut with a good coal burning stove. There he enjoyed himself as he had farmed Rousam with his father David until 1913, so naturally he knew everyone locally.
On one occasion he was skiving off and sitting in the farm house at the Bu’ of Rousam with his feet under the table when someone rushed in and told him his Sergeant had come stealthily and quietly out to Stronsay by a small motor boat and was marching up to Rousam Head to check up on things. Arriving at the watch hut the Sergeant found Private Pottinger missing. Back down to the Bu’ to find the miscreant, didn’t really think father had fallen over the cliff. But father had dodged out the back door, crossed the “Peedie Loch“ next the steading by the causeway, got back up to the watch hut in the Sergeant’s absence by a hill track. When the Sergeant came back from his abortive search father was marching up and down the cliffs with his rifle on his shoulder. When charged with “Desertion of his Post in Time of War” he said he had been further along the cliffs as he had heard something suspicious and thought it might have been the German Army and the Kaiser invading. And that was that.
In 1940 the LDV were at first unkindly called “Look, Duck and Vanish”, which actually could have been excellent advice. They only had armbands and pitch forks with which to drill but as time went on uniforms arrived and a consignment of Canadian .300 rifles with bayonets arrived in wooden boxes totally filled with grease. Everyone was issued with his rifle and bayonet and I remember father cleaning his to perfection in the kitchen. He then went through the drill to perfection for our benefit - slope arms, present arms, port arms, atten-shun, stand at ease, fix bayonettes, lunge, parry, all the other mysterious things soldiers did with a rifle. We had never thought our farmer father could be so smart, but he was.
One should not in fairness dismiss the Home Guard as in Dad’s Army shown on T.V.. In it were many men who had been on the Western Front and survived right through that Hell, a bit older now twenty two years on from 1918 but still hard and fit men in their forties working on the land or in the fishing. These occupations were exempt from War Service unless a man wanted to go, few did. So the War passed us by and farming carried on.
In the middle of the Island just below the Wireless Station was the rifle range with a target just above the beach, bullets going safely through into the water beyond. I think it was a useful relic from at least World War 1, possibly from much earlier. The Boer War comes to mind, perhaps even the Crimean. Still totally usable, the Home Guard did their rifle shooting practice there. Went a few times with father to watch, and fired a shot once from a rifle under father’s very careful supervision. Not too bad a kick either if you held it tight to your shoulder. A Home Guard with a white and a red flag kept score from a pit safely under the target, signaling success or otherwise with numbers 1 to 10 held up above the parapet on sticks. I had a lucky 10, Bull’s Eye, beginners luck I guess. .
On Burgh Head facing to the East and to Germany the Home Guard had a lookout hut which was manned by rota. I remember father going off in his uniform and his three stripes to do his nightly stint, but with a goodly number of men available the rota was not too onerous. The old photograph of the Stronsay Home Guard shows 42 men, some I knew, some I remember only the face. Some are still alive today. Ralph Maxwell is one, third from left in front row, now a retired farmer near Turriff. Just recently turned 90 and gone off on a cruise to celebrate. Hardy.
The Home Guard drilled in the Territorial Hall in the centre of the Island, they must have done some exercises too but we did not see them. Rousam Head was a heathery wilderness and some exercises were done there. Night ones too. It was all taken very seriously, justly so after Dunkirk.
In the village the few herring drifters who might have called ceased, the declining herring fishing nearly all finished anyway before the War. Stronsay was used as a night port for trawlers who went to sea in daytime to fish but had by order to come in to harbour and safety during the night. A policeman, Yorston, was stationed full time in Stronsay during the War, and the trawler men gave him some custom at times. I guess anyone who went to sea with all the risks of War was entitled to get seriously drunk when ashore. Sadly, not all the trawlers survived. Best story I was told was the time Yorston was coming into his own house while the trawler men were having a barny outside. His wife thought he was an intruder and belted him solidly over the head with a frying pan. True or false I do not know, I think it was, and it makes a good story anyway.
Another episode was a Norwegian fishing boat coming South from Lerwick in Shetland having escaped the Germans. Not the only one by any means but this one I remember well. We went to the Village to see it. The boat was very full of escapees and also leaking very badly with very little freeboard left. Her pumps were unable to cope and they just made it. The Earl Sigurd came out to Stronsay from Kirkwall with the fire brigade with pumps and kept her floating. She was then beached on the high tide at the back of the pier and repairs sufficient to take her in to Kirkwall were made. We went down to the Village to see all the excitement, could not understand a word they said. Odd. But Jimmie Fiddler our Postmaster had married Bertha, a Norwegian girl, and no problem at all. Other Norwegian boats came in from time to time but none so near destruction as that one. Stronsay was the nearest Island to Norway and the best old Viking landfall anyway - the Island of the Strands [beaches] Island, therefore Stronjsey. Unfortunately there were also Norwegian boats that did not survive the perils of the sea or the Germans, but we only knew of them when enquiries were made by other escapees as to whether they had arrived. The empty silence told its own sad story.
ALL OUR YESTERDAYS is a phrase which rings in my ears. Someone recently mentioned the War – 1939 to 1945 – an American oddly enough in Forss House one evening - and he asked how we then lived, what was rationing like, did we go hungry. Hauled me back in time a good bit but made me think of those far off days for most of which we were in Stronsay. Then from May 1944 in Caithness. Allowing for a child not remembering the first few years of life, there are few now alive other than pensioners, and not all of them either, who has memory of those perilous days.
On Stronsay, a quiet backwater in so many ways, we had visible enough signs of War. First I remember was being issued with identity cards and gas masks at every house just before War was declared. We bairns had to take them with us to school and be instructed how to put them on properly. Smell of new grey rubber and French chalk and making rude noises by blowing too fiercely. For a time we were obliged to carry them but that drill did not last too long.
Near the Central School in the middle of the island and on our way to school a Communications Wireless Station had been erected, webs of masts and wires and insulators, with a building for the generator and working space for the operators. The station was in line of sight from Sanday to the North with its Radar Station and the Mainland to the South, making a link between them. When we passed there was usually the song of the wind sighing and soughing through the wires and an electrical crackle and fizzle and pop as well. When the Radar Station was erected on Sanday to our North the four huge masts were seen well enough from Stronsay. A young man from Stronsay fell to his death there while working on their erection. Another Stronsay lad was sent down the coalmines as a Bevin Boy, as they called them, and lost his life there. I remember his sad funereal. These things hit a small island hard.
The LDV (Local Defense Volunteers) were formed in 1940, then renamed The Home Guard. We called them “Dad’s Army” long before T.V. pinched our title!! Our father [ Dad ] was the Sergeant. He had First World War experience in the Seaforths but never went to France, or I guess we would not be here now. At the outbreak of War in August 1914 he, like so many others, was in the Territorial Army and was mobilized at the very beginning. He never did speak much about that time in his life, too many good friends never came home. He spent the time he was in the Army hauling defence guns up the sheer cliffs of the Barrel of Butter, a monstrously steep rock in Scapa Flow, put in some time at Fort George, was sent out to Stronsay to mount guard with two other Terriers on Rousam Head in a small watch hut with a good coal burning stove. There he enjoyed himself as he had farmed Rousam with his father David until 1913, so naturally he knew everyone locally.
On one occasion he was skiving off and sitting in the farm house at the Bu’ of Rousam with his feet under the table when someone rushed in and told him his Sergeant had come stealthily and quietly out to Stronsay by a small motor boat and was marching up to Rousam Head to check up on things. Arriving at the watch hut the Sergeant found Private Pottinger missing. Back down to the Bu’ to find the miscreant, didn’t really think father had fallen over the cliff. But father had dodged out the back door, crossed the “Peedie Loch“ next the steading by the causeway, got back up to the watch hut in the Sergeant’s absence by a hill track. When the Sergeant came back from his abortive search father was marching up and down the cliffs with his rifle on his shoulder. When charged with “Desertion of his Post in Time of War” he said he had been further along the cliffs as he had heard something suspicious and thought it might have been the German Army and the Kaiser invading. And that was that.
In 1940 the LDV were at first unkindly called “Look, Duck and Vanish”, which actually could have been excellent advice. They only had armbands and pitch forks with which to drill but as time went on uniforms arrived and a consignment of Canadian .300 rifles with bayonets arrived in wooden boxes totally filled with grease. Everyone was issued with his rifle and bayonet and I remember father cleaning his to perfection in the kitchen. He then went through the drill to perfection for our benefit - slope arms, present arms, port arms, atten-shun, stand at ease, fix bayonettes, lunge, parry, all the other mysterious things soldiers did with a rifle. We had never thought our farmer father could be so smart, but he was.
One should not in fairness dismiss the Home Guard as in Dad’s Army shown on T.V.. In it were many men who had been on the Western Front and survived right through that Hell, a bit older now twenty two years on from 1918 but still hard and fit men in their forties working on the land or in the fishing. These occupations were exempt from War Service unless a man wanted to go, few did. So the War passed us by and farming carried on.
In the middle of the Island just below the Wireless Station was the rifle range with a target just above the beach, bullets going safely through into the water beyond. I think it was a useful relic from at least World War 1, possibly from much earlier. The Boer War comes to mind, perhaps even the Crimean. Still totally usable, the Home Guard did their rifle shooting practice there. Went a few times with father to watch, and fired a shot once from a rifle under father’s very careful supervision. Not too bad a kick either if you held it tight to your shoulder. A Home Guard with a white and a red flag kept score from a pit safely under the target, signaling success or otherwise with numbers 1 to 10 held up above the parapet on sticks. I had a lucky 10, Bull’s Eye, beginners luck I guess. .
On Burgh Head facing to the East and to Germany the Home Guard had a lookout hut which was manned by rota. I remember father going off in his uniform and his three stripes to do his nightly stint, but with a goodly number of men available the rota was not too onerous. The old photograph of the Stronsay Home Guard shows 42 men, some I knew, some I remember only the face. Some are still alive today. Ralph Maxwell is one, third from left in front row, now a retired farmer near Turriff. Just recently turned 90 and gone off on a cruise to celebrate. Hardy.
The Home Guard drilled in the Territorial Hall in the centre of the Island, they must have done some exercises too but we did not see them. Rousam Head was a heathery wilderness and some exercises were done there. Night ones too. It was all taken very seriously, justly so after Dunkirk.
In the village the few herring drifters who might have called ceased, the declining herring fishing nearly all finished anyway before the War. Stronsay was used as a night port for trawlers who went to sea in daytime to fish but had by order to come in to harbour and safety during the night. A policeman, Yorston, was stationed full time in Stronsay during the War, and the trawler men gave him some custom at times. I guess anyone who went to sea with all the risks of War was entitled to get seriously drunk when ashore. Sadly, not all the trawlers survived. Best story I was told was the time Yorston was coming into his own house while the trawler men were having a barny outside. His wife thought he was an intruder and belted him solidly over the head with a frying pan. True or false I do not know, I think it was, and it makes a good story anyway.
Another episode was a Norwegian fishing boat coming South from Lerwick in Shetland having escaped the Germans. Not the only one by any means but this one I remember well. We went to the Village to see it. The boat was very full of escapees and also leaking very badly with very little freeboard left. Her pumps were unable to cope and they just made it. The Earl Sigurd came out to Stronsay from Kirkwall with the fire brigade with pumps and kept her floating. She was then beached on the high tide at the back of the pier and repairs sufficient to take her in to Kirkwall were made. We went down to the Village to see all the excitement, could not understand a word they said. Odd. But Jimmie Fiddler our Postmaster had married Bertha, a Norwegian girl, and no problem at all. Other Norwegian boats came in from time to time but none so near destruction as that one. Stronsay was the nearest Island to Norway and the best old Viking landfall anyway - the Island of the Strands [beaches] Island, therefore Stronjsey. Unfortunately there were also Norwegian boats that did not survive the perils of the sea or the Germans, but we only knew of them when enquiries were made by other escapees as to whether they had arrived. The empty silence told its own sad story.
Monday, 21 September 2009
Hatching Chickens, and Geese,
A long time ago, but yesterday too. Rain On My Window (Tears in My Eyes) will be an ongoing tale of my early memories of life shared by my younger brother David on Whitehall Farm in Stronsay, Orkney, of our childhood on a working farm in the 1930s before we lost our innocence.
No 55. COUNTING THE CHICKENS – AND THE GEESE.
Today we hear so much about the mythical “Family Farm”, with visions of contented cows being milked by sonsy maidens, patiently the time chewing a bit of clover leaf, maybe a four-leafed one. The hens are surrounding the auld wife as she dells oot scattered handfu’s o’ oats with one hand from a bucket held under the oxter of her other arm. The pet lamb tugs at the teat on a bottle of milk held by the wee lass. At the back door the auld broon and white collie dog lies curled contentedly waiting for the boss to come awa oot and they will tak a turn up the hill tae hae a luk at the sheep.
The horse looks over the fence. The old sow hangs over her pen gate with front legs gracefully holding her up as she takes a look around. If she hears the clatter of a pail she gives great encouragement to hurry up, she is always hungry. The ducks are having a swim on the pond, the mother goose waddles along with her goslings following. A rabbit chews his way through the lettuce in the kitchen garden.
Well, I saw it all a Long Time Ago. We seemed to have a bit of everything around Whitehall, and our father was a bit of a magician at handling all the different birds and animals we had. And he seemed to have plenty time to do so, no mad rushing from pillar to post as today, finish one job and rush on to the next. The pace of life was a bit more sane than now. We indeed had all these old fashioned farmyard creatures.
There was always something to be seen on most farms, some activity of farming life, hens scratching around, the cock chasing his amorata of the moment. The grey geese in the Front Park flapping their wings in a useless attempt to fly, honking the while. It was a bit of fun for them. They could indeed manage to run and lift a few yards off the ground, especially going down a slope into the wind, but they were just not designed to be air-born or for the space age.
Turkeys do not seem to be too much in my memory, we had a few but kept well away from them as the turkey cock could be a mad loon at times. They could fly up into a stack in the corn yard but usually did not take such exercise. They were of the old grey bronze variety, a bit old fashioned now but a good bird in its day.
Breeding, or rather hatching, all these different birds was an art form. Father had a crazy knack of setting a hen in the most unlikely places, an aumry in the stable, an empty stall in the byre in summer, a corner just about anywhere. I think he got a great deal of fun out of taking a visitor around and stopping here and there to have a look at some clucker. Sometimes he would get a setting from a neighbour who would exchange a dozen eggs. “Try this ones, Tom, this new breed are great layers”. I think he could have set a hen on eggs on top of a telephone pole, except we had no telephone.
His victims were readily available, the hen house provided him with a steady supply of clucking hens, a nuisance in the henhouse as they would monopolise the nests and make the active layers drop their eggs on the floor instead of in a clean newly-strawed nest. Never one to see anyone idle, man or beast, he would make the clucker work for her living by hatching whatever eggs came to hand. That meant that she could be sitting on hen eggs, duck eggs, goose eggs, or rarely turkey eggs.
The geese would make a nest out in a corner of the field, or in a small hutch or barrel handily left for them. One of our small-boy tasks was to find a nest in some out-of-the-way spot where the goose thought she was safe from prying eyes. It was interesting to catch the goose on her way to lay an egg, she was as cunning as could be, and would only sneak to her nest if she thought we were not around. A goose could lay a dozen eggs or more before she began sitting. Father would steal the eggs, for a time, not more than four from any one goose at one every two days as she layed them. He did not wish to discourage her so most were left in the nest, a goose could count, and she would keep on laying until she had enough to sit on. A goose egg is a bit monstrous compared to a hen egg, four goose eggs made a good setting for a hen to cover adequately. A fresh goose egg made a real breakfast but could choke a horse, and only a odd cracked one made its way to the table, fried with the yolk broken, never boiled. Tasty too.
The stolen (borrowed!!) goose eggs were very carefully kept in a soft lined box, and when father had his four eggs and a clucking hen appeared he would find a suitable site and set the hen. It might take a day or two for her to settle down and usually a loose lid was put on top of the box for a few days. Occasionally a hen would not co-operate but another clucker would easily be found to keep the eggs warm.
Wooden egg boxes belonging to Orkney Egg Producers. Ltd., which held 240 eggs in two sides made good boxes, one hen each side. Four goose eggs made a good setting, a hen could cover them adequately. Father made use of feed boxes in the stable stalls, an odd barrel, a corner of the cow byre, indeed any byre, but this was a summer time job so the cattle were out and the byres were empty.
One task was to lift the hen off her eggs to give her a bit of feed and a drink. This was especially needed when sitting on geese eggs as hen eggs took three weeks to hatch but duck and geese eggs took four, so a sitting hen could get quite thin if not fed a bit.
It was not out-with Father’s province to have her sit on Mallard eggs, the old Stock Duck of the Vikings and still called so in places. Domesticated, the Mallard was the ancestor of our farmyard Khaki Campbell duck, so someone long years ago pinched a few Mallard eggs as well as our father. Probably a Campbell!!
The Mallard and the farm yard duck could indeed interbreed, but very rarely. The wild duck eggs were filched from a nearby small lochan down at Old St Peter’s Kirkyard on the shore where Father had spotted a mallard duck trying her best to remain invisible. It was also quite possible for a mallard to make a nest half way up an un-thrashed stack of oats still in the stackyard in summer, but any stack left over would always be built on a raised steathe to stop entry by vermin which in summer time would have riddled an unthrashed stack to utter destruction.
Father would take only enough Mallard eggs for a setting, not more than five, leaving most of the wild duck eggs for nature to take its course. It is worthy of note that Mallard ducks, wild birds as they are, still come in about a farm and even across the road from where I sit in the farmhouse of Isauld they sneak into the feed shed to see of they can find a bit of loose grain. Totally not domesticated, they still have an affinity with man which is quite wonderful, and are the only wild duck I know that comes into such close contact with ourselves. In winter they would be quite happy in the stackyard gleaning a bit of loose grain from a thrashed stack steadle. I do not know what makes the Mallard behave so, but it is a fact. They are without doubt the most beautiful of all the ducks, absolutely my favourite. They also pair up for life so are seen usually in their pairs, only bunching up a bit in winter and not too much then.
This setting and hatching of eggs was a favourite ploy of our father, he was good at it, got a great deal of fun out of it, and it never left him even to the end of his days at Greenland Mains in 1958.
.
.
No 55. COUNTING THE CHICKENS – AND THE GEESE.
Today we hear so much about the mythical “Family Farm”, with visions of contented cows being milked by sonsy maidens, patiently the time chewing a bit of clover leaf, maybe a four-leafed one. The hens are surrounding the auld wife as she dells oot scattered handfu’s o’ oats with one hand from a bucket held under the oxter of her other arm. The pet lamb tugs at the teat on a bottle of milk held by the wee lass. At the back door the auld broon and white collie dog lies curled contentedly waiting for the boss to come awa oot and they will tak a turn up the hill tae hae a luk at the sheep.
The horse looks over the fence. The old sow hangs over her pen gate with front legs gracefully holding her up as she takes a look around. If she hears the clatter of a pail she gives great encouragement to hurry up, she is always hungry. The ducks are having a swim on the pond, the mother goose waddles along with her goslings following. A rabbit chews his way through the lettuce in the kitchen garden.
Well, I saw it all a Long Time Ago. We seemed to have a bit of everything around Whitehall, and our father was a bit of a magician at handling all the different birds and animals we had. And he seemed to have plenty time to do so, no mad rushing from pillar to post as today, finish one job and rush on to the next. The pace of life was a bit more sane than now. We indeed had all these old fashioned farmyard creatures.
There was always something to be seen on most farms, some activity of farming life, hens scratching around, the cock chasing his amorata of the moment. The grey geese in the Front Park flapping their wings in a useless attempt to fly, honking the while. It was a bit of fun for them. They could indeed manage to run and lift a few yards off the ground, especially going down a slope into the wind, but they were just not designed to be air-born or for the space age.
Turkeys do not seem to be too much in my memory, we had a few but kept well away from them as the turkey cock could be a mad loon at times. They could fly up into a stack in the corn yard but usually did not take such exercise. They were of the old grey bronze variety, a bit old fashioned now but a good bird in its day.
Breeding, or rather hatching, all these different birds was an art form. Father had a crazy knack of setting a hen in the most unlikely places, an aumry in the stable, an empty stall in the byre in summer, a corner just about anywhere. I think he got a great deal of fun out of taking a visitor around and stopping here and there to have a look at some clucker. Sometimes he would get a setting from a neighbour who would exchange a dozen eggs. “Try this ones, Tom, this new breed are great layers”. I think he could have set a hen on eggs on top of a telephone pole, except we had no telephone.
His victims were readily available, the hen house provided him with a steady supply of clucking hens, a nuisance in the henhouse as they would monopolise the nests and make the active layers drop their eggs on the floor instead of in a clean newly-strawed nest. Never one to see anyone idle, man or beast, he would make the clucker work for her living by hatching whatever eggs came to hand. That meant that she could be sitting on hen eggs, duck eggs, goose eggs, or rarely turkey eggs.
The geese would make a nest out in a corner of the field, or in a small hutch or barrel handily left for them. One of our small-boy tasks was to find a nest in some out-of-the-way spot where the goose thought she was safe from prying eyes. It was interesting to catch the goose on her way to lay an egg, she was as cunning as could be, and would only sneak to her nest if she thought we were not around. A goose could lay a dozen eggs or more before she began sitting. Father would steal the eggs, for a time, not more than four from any one goose at one every two days as she layed them. He did not wish to discourage her so most were left in the nest, a goose could count, and she would keep on laying until she had enough to sit on. A goose egg is a bit monstrous compared to a hen egg, four goose eggs made a good setting for a hen to cover adequately. A fresh goose egg made a real breakfast but could choke a horse, and only a odd cracked one made its way to the table, fried with the yolk broken, never boiled. Tasty too.
The stolen (borrowed!!) goose eggs were very carefully kept in a soft lined box, and when father had his four eggs and a clucking hen appeared he would find a suitable site and set the hen. It might take a day or two for her to settle down and usually a loose lid was put on top of the box for a few days. Occasionally a hen would not co-operate but another clucker would easily be found to keep the eggs warm.
Wooden egg boxes belonging to Orkney Egg Producers. Ltd., which held 240 eggs in two sides made good boxes, one hen each side. Four goose eggs made a good setting, a hen could cover them adequately. Father made use of feed boxes in the stable stalls, an odd barrel, a corner of the cow byre, indeed any byre, but this was a summer time job so the cattle were out and the byres were empty.
One task was to lift the hen off her eggs to give her a bit of feed and a drink. This was especially needed when sitting on geese eggs as hen eggs took three weeks to hatch but duck and geese eggs took four, so a sitting hen could get quite thin if not fed a bit.
It was not out-with Father’s province to have her sit on Mallard eggs, the old Stock Duck of the Vikings and still called so in places. Domesticated, the Mallard was the ancestor of our farmyard Khaki Campbell duck, so someone long years ago pinched a few Mallard eggs as well as our father. Probably a Campbell!!
The Mallard and the farm yard duck could indeed interbreed, but very rarely. The wild duck eggs were filched from a nearby small lochan down at Old St Peter’s Kirkyard on the shore where Father had spotted a mallard duck trying her best to remain invisible. It was also quite possible for a mallard to make a nest half way up an un-thrashed stack of oats still in the stackyard in summer, but any stack left over would always be built on a raised steathe to stop entry by vermin which in summer time would have riddled an unthrashed stack to utter destruction.
Father would take only enough Mallard eggs for a setting, not more than five, leaving most of the wild duck eggs for nature to take its course. It is worthy of note that Mallard ducks, wild birds as they are, still come in about a farm and even across the road from where I sit in the farmhouse of Isauld they sneak into the feed shed to see of they can find a bit of loose grain. Totally not domesticated, they still have an affinity with man which is quite wonderful, and are the only wild duck I know that comes into such close contact with ourselves. In winter they would be quite happy in the stackyard gleaning a bit of loose grain from a thrashed stack steadle. I do not know what makes the Mallard behave so, but it is a fact. They are without doubt the most beautiful of all the ducks, absolutely my favourite. They also pair up for life so are seen usually in their pairs, only bunching up a bit in winter and not too much then.
This setting and hatching of eggs was a favourite ploy of our father, he was good at it, got a great deal of fun out of it, and it never left him even to the end of his days at Greenland Mains in 1958.
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