The Mens' Gardens.

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.

AN OLD WHITE ROSE, FROM YESTERDAY’S GARDENS..

The farm servants’ gardens were a place of domestic bliss, a place to work in the evenings at your own speed without the “Boss” shouting at you to hurry up, although “her indoors” might just do that. As the weather calmed after winter the men emerged in the evening with shirt sleeves rolled up and good intentions to “dell” (dig) their gardens, normally at the front of their house. They usually also had a hen house at the back and often a pigsty for a pig or two. Around the garden either a stone dyke or a flagstone one, much needed for shelter in Stronsay, or in Caithness. A squeaky gate, a narrow path up the middle, thin bits of flagstones set on edge for sides and dividers, paths often paved with shingle off the shore because we were beside the sea. Blackcurrant and redcurrant bushes round the walls and in the corners, and sometimes gooseberries. An old herring net to protect the berries. Honeysuckle either side of the gate with its well named sweet lingering smell, an evening breath, a sprig in the buttonhole for Church on Sunday. Or a rose bush or two, that old white rose that still has the best scent of any. Fushia in profusion, ox eyed daisies, red and white campion outside the walls, kind of a weed but nice and grew well beside the dykes in the fields too. London Pride each side up the main path. A few flowers according to the worker’s wife’s fancy, but not too much.
And rhubarb, always rhubarb, a small sweet red variety and a coarse variety with huge stems if not cut soon enough. We thought the redder the better. If enough sugar then jam making was the order of the day, the kitchen steaming, the huge brass jam pot bubbling on the stove, the delicious aroma penetrating the whole house. Jam jars were resurrected from odd corners and scalded clean with boiling water. During the War we could apply for and get a bit of extra sugar from officialdom, making jam was encouraged and a most welcome addition to our rationed selves. Country wide. The men, or rather their wives, always put a bit of ginger into the rhubarb if they could get it.
Today we have every vegetable under the Sun in the Supermarket, plastic wrapped, clean, foreign, enticing, tasteless. But in my early days buying vegetables was unknown. So working in their gardens was the evening job for the men, dell the ground early to let the frost break it down into a fine tilth, plan the layout for the season to vary and change the beds. Usually, indeed always,
a cart load of well rotted dung (FYM) from the cattle midden was tipped outside the garden wall, left to further rot down all winter - nowadays it is called “composting” - then barrowed in or thrown over the dyke and generously dug down. The gardens often had their various beds delineated just by narrow earthen paths, trodden hard by tackety boots over many long years.

First to be planted in Spring were the early tatties, specially chitted (sprouted) for a flying start. The men had their earlies to plant in the field as well in their allowed 60 chains but the garden ones could be planted sooner at a time of their own choosing without waiting for the later farm tattie planting. Planted out in the garden and leaving the sheltered corners for more tender plants. Dig the first row and bed it with some dung, good natural fertilizer, plant the row, then start all over again with the next. The earth was thrown over the first row from the second to cover the seed, and so on till the patch was finished. Weeding came later, but tattie leaves soon covered the rows and shaded out any weeds. We never heard of potato eel worm, that bane of gardens further south, and of Southern potato farmers as well. The cherished early tatties were the first to be planted, and near enough a competition to see who would be the first to get them in, and the first to lift them later. “Trying the tatties” it was called, “Hiv ye tried yir tatties yet, Wullie bhoy?” “Yaas, lifted a few bleams last Setterday and we hid them for Sunday denner”. “ Whit lek, Wullie? Whit lek? Wir they good?”. “Pure nectar, Jeemie, chuist pure nectar”. And these new-lifted garden tatties were indeed the tastiest you could ever dream of.

Cabbages were usually started from seed in shallow boxes before planting time, sometimes indoors or in the porch of the house, sometimes under a simple glass frame in the garden, maybe only an old window set on a low stone wall square. Seed packets appeared in the local shop, early cabbage, late cabbage, white cabbage, winter cabbage, curly kale, savoys for later use, brussels sprouts, cauliflower, broccoli, onions, leeks, carrots, beetroot, lettuce, peas, beans. The list is endless. Sometimes one worker was better than anyone else at starting plants from seed, or his wife had green fingers, and times they swopped a few plants. Much of the seed came by the Postman, mail ordered from a catalogue.

Beds were worked till fine enough, dug over again, raked, leveled, a tight line between two wooden pegs to keep everything straight. Speak of fussy women, nothing matched a farm worker in his pomp. The back of a rake or the edge of a hoe scratched a fine shallow groove along the line of the string, dead straight for pride, or even the sharp end of a stick.

According to what was needed, a pinch of carrot seeds between thumb and fore-finger, sprinkled thinly and lightly covered, or lettuce, or beetroot, or radishes. And always shallots, always shallots, I think the pride of most farm worker gardens, get them in early too. After the tatties I seem to remember that the next task was the shallots, Grown from a single shallot bulb rather than a young plant as were the onions, good ones being hand picked and kept over from last year for seed. The shallots got plenty room, voraciously responding to good feeding and very rewarding. We were fascinated to see them multiply to an unbelievable cluster of separate young shallots come autumn, we used to count them to see who had the greatest number on one plant. Later in autumn their leaves would be bent over, two rows towards each other, then lifted when leaf dry and strung in bunches along that thin strong tarry old herring-net rope that fronted many a cottage wall to further dry before indoor storing for winter. Boiled shallots were really tasty with mince or cold roast lamb, or more likely farm-butchered mutton from an older sheep, and all the tastier too. Don’t get it nowadays in our butchers either.


On to the onion sets, small young plants in bunches grown from seed, disentangled and planted singly in line, six inches apart if for mature picking, the width of a hoe, three inches if every second one was to be picked early for garnish or soups or stews or whatever, leaving the others more space to grow to full size. Young plants watered to get a good start.

Leeks were planted, young single plants again, and sheep droppings were later collected off the fields to be steeped in a pail of water to make a special brew to gently feed them. Seed and Root Show stuff with the W.R.I.., and some leeks were monstrous. No wonder the Welsh wave them about at their Rugby Internationals. All too soon they will be classed by the P.C. as yet another dangerous weapon, and one more wonderful old tradition will be lost. A clout over the ear with a large leek was to be avoided, the Welsh know a thing or two, indeed to goodness they do, boyo!!

Weeding was a never ending task but these gardens were not too dirty as many years of TLC had reduced the weed burden. Still, weeds are always with us. Workers gardens were inspected by visitors, commented on as need be. Pride was paramount, and many a worker was shamed by his fellows to keep his garden well. Even our father at times would have a look. I think they all got a great deal of fun out of their gardens, as well they might.
Only now do I realize that these gardens were not just for show, they provided a great deal of good food for the workers, fresh and in season, or stored for winter, and if they bought all they grew for themselves at today’s prices it would cost a small fortune.