Is Angus Part of "Ballad Land"?

   The ballad tradition in Scotland in one of the jewels in the national culture and flourised mostly in two areas, the borders and the north-east, which means in this context Aberdeenshire and Moray and Banff.  Any geographical definition of North-East Scotland usually excludes Angus, which sometimes (uneasily?) sits in geographical designations such as 'North East Central Scotland'.  There are relatively few ballads which can conclusively be proven to have Angus as their setting, which is not to say there were not songs and ballads ascribed to particular authors of the 19th century and before which passed from person to person and may have entered oral tradition to some extent.

   Considered here are certain ballads which may have Angus as a backdrop, though the claim can be contested.  At the end of the article I could not resist adding another variant of 'The Bonnie Hoose o Airlie', whose location of course is not in dispute.

Young Reiden

   The redoubtable Andrew Jervise states in Memorials of Angus and the Mearns (1861, vol I, pp. 85-8) that this ballad has been placed by some in the parish of Farnell.

At Red Den, on the west side of the parish...the spring called Reiden's Well is locally described as the scene of the tragedy of 'Young Reiden,' celebrated in the ballad of that name.  This idea, except in the third line of the opening stanza of the ballad as rehearsed by the old people of Farnell, is not borne out by the context, and it appears to have originated in the peculiarity of the name, and in the freak of some local rhymster, who (although he preserves 'Clyde water' and other associations of the older ballad) makes his version open prosily thus:—

Young Reiden was a gentleman,

A gentleman of fame ;

An' he 's awa' to East Fithie,

To see his comely dame.

Fithie had a castle, the remains of which form the back wall of a cottar house; and upon an adjoining knoll to the east, popular story avers that the 'lady fair' was burnt for themurder of young Reiden. The lands of Fithie gave surname to a family that held a respectable position in the county from about the middle of the thirteenth century until within these two hundred years. These lands also paid feu-duties to the Bishop of Brechin, and probably the De Fithies were vassals of the Bishops down to the year 1457, as at that time George Leslie, the first Earl of Rothes, had a grant of Easter Fithies, and this was confirmed by charter, under the Great Seal, to the third Earl in 1511. In little more than a century afterwards the property came intothe hands of Sir Robert Carnegie of Kinnaird. At one time

View towards Greenlaw, Farnell

Leezie Lindsay

   Like may traditional ballads, 'Leezie Lindsay' is frustratingly short of internal detail which would help the reader/hearer know who the characters are or where the scene of the narrative was set.  According to Robert Ford's Vagabond Songs and Ballads of Scotland (1901), the main female character was known in the common tradition of the Mearns to be one of the Lindsay family's branch from Edzell in Angus.

Will ye gang wi me, Leezie Lindsay?

Will ye gang tae the Highlands wi' me?

Will ye gang wi me, Leezie Lindsay?

My bride and my darling tae be?

Tae gang tae the Highlands wi you, sir.

I dinna ken how that can be.

For I ken na the land that ye live in,

Nor ken I the lad I'm gae wi'.

O Leezie, lass, ye maun ken little

If sae be ye dinna ken me,

For my name is Lord Ronald McDonald,

A chieftain o' high degree.

She has kilted up her skirts o' green satin,

She has kilted them up to her knee,

And she's aff wi' Lord Ronald McDonald,

His bride and his darlin' tae be.

Sir James the Rose

   In a previous post (More On The Lindsays and the Families of Stirling and Auchterhouse Castle)
 I noted that the historian of Auchterhouse parish, Rev. James Inglis, tried his best to prove that the ballad called 'Sir James the Ross' has its setting locally.  According to him, the ballad relates of the deadly rivalry between Sir James Ross and Sir John Graeme, both suitors of Matilda, daughter of the Earl of Buchan.  It only remains to be added that no other written authorities (that I can find anyway) give any credence for stating that the story had its origins here.  There are few modern academics who seem to be attempting to discover the 'truth' or otherwise of the border and north-east ballads.  In the the Edwardian age) Fitzwilliam Elliot devoted much energy in this area in his work The Trustworthiness of Border Ballads (published in 190), but it was perhaps an impossible task.

The Bonnie Hoose o Airlie

   As I said above, I will finish with another version of 'The Bonnie Hoose o Airlie'.  No need here to go into the backstory of the ballad.  But an interesting aside is provided by Robert Bond's Vagabond Songs and Ballads of  Scotland (1901), which shines a light on the latter days of ballad performance in an urban setting:

Thirty and odd years ago there was a decrepit old man who used to haunt the Nethergate and Perth Road of Dundee who sang nothing else, and his rendition was so singularly absurd that he had many mock imitators among the younger generations thereaway, who knew the old vocalist only by the self-created name of  'Leddy Ogilby.' 

It fell upon a day, and a bonnie summer day,

When the aits grew green and the barley,

That there fell out a great dispute

Between Argyle and Airlie.

The Duke o' Montrose has written to Argyle

To come in the morning early;

And he's up and awa' by the back o' Dunkeld,

To plunder the bonnie House o' Airlie.

Lady Ogilvie look'd ower frae her high Castle wa'.

And O, but she sigh'd sairly,

When she saw Argyle wi' a hunder o' his men.

Come to plunder the bonnie House o' Airlie.

'Come down, come down, Lady Ogilvie,' he says,

'Come down, and kiss me fairly;

Or I swear by the sword that hangs in my hand,

I winna leave a stannin' stane in Airlie.

'I'm no come down to thee, proud Argyle,

Nor wad I kiss thee fairly;

I'll no come down thou fause, fause lord,

Tho' thou shouldna leave a stannin' stane in Airlie.

If my gude lord had been at hame,

As he's awa' wi' Charlie,

There durstna a Campbell in a' Argyle,

Set a fit upon the bonnie green o' Airlie.

'If my gude lord were here this nicht,

As he is wi' King Charlie,

The dearest blude o' a' thy kin,

Wad slocken the burnin' o' Airlie.

'O, I ha'e borne him seven bonnie sons.

The youngest ne'er saw his daddie,

And though I had as mony ower again,

I wad gi'e them a' to Prince Charlie.'

Argyle in a rage attacked the bonnie ha'.

And he's to the plundering fairly;

And tears tho' he saw, like dewdrops fa'.

In a lowe he set the bonnie House o' Airlie !

'What lowe is yon ?' quo' the gude Lochiel,

'That loups ower the hilltaps clearly ?'

'By the God of my kin !'" cried the young Ogilvie,

'It's my ain dear bonnie House o' Airlie !

'It's no the bonnie house, nor the lands a' reft.

That grieves my heart sae sairly;

But O, the winsome dame and the sweet babes I left.

They'll be smoor'd in the black reek o' Airlie.'

'Draw your dirks ! draw your dirks ! " cried the brave

Lochiel;

'Unsheath your swords !' cried Charlie,

'And we'll kindle a lowe round the fause Argyle,

And licht it wi' a spark out o' Airlie.'