Ferryden in the Nineteenth Century

The History of Ferryden was written by Andrew Douglas and published in 1855.  Much of the work focuses on his reminiscences of his time as a schoolteacher just across the water in the village of Ferryden.  His does not not back at his time with unalloyed sentiment and his first impressions of the fishing hamlet when he arrived in 1820 were not good:

My first impressions of the physical and moral condition of my new companions were not of the most favorable character. I did not think I could endure their society. The amenities of my situation were 'few and far between,' and in no case indigenous to the sphere of my labours—it was only by escaping from the interior of the village that a congenial atmosphere, moral or physical, could be obtained. Clean thoroughfares through Ferryden there were none. The main avenues to every quarter were blocked up by a succession of large pits, containing heaps of mussel-shells and fish offal, thrown out by the inhabitants, who seemed loath to part with such relics, if their tolerance of the villanous effluvium discharged therefrom can be regarded as an indication of such a disposition. Mussels are mussels now, because they must be paid for in the current coin of the realm; but in those days they were to be had gratis. The pits referred to often accumulated to imposing dimensions; and it was, in consequence, quite an adventure to perambulate the village after night-fall, for one might fall over these mounds of putrefaction. (pp. 5-6.)

   The account, with its heartfelt complaint from an intelligent man stranded in uncongenial territory, reminds me of the plight of Dundonian doctor and scholar Peter Goldman, who, in old age, found himself stranded among unschooled fishermen in north Fife. (His fascinating story can be read here.)

   One of the keynotes in the Ferryden book is, of course, change.  When Douglas first went to the village there were only 470 souls in the place; the population had nearly  tripled by the time he was writing. This can be compared with the figures noted by the minister in the Old Statistical Account in 1792, when there were 38 families in Ferryden (compared with 20 in its neighbour Usan).  Six boats were active at that date from the port, each employing 4 men.

 By 1836, Douglas tells, us the place was thriving due to an upturn in the fishing industry. According to the New Statistical Report in 1845:

The white or sea-fishing is carried on by the inhabitants of two villages, Ferryden and Usan, to a very great extent. The former contains a population of 679, and the latter of 142, the greater part of whom are employed in the fishing,- in the one, 85 families, or 590 souls; in the other, 16 families, or 85 souls. In Ferrydcn 25 boats are regularly employed; 18 of these, of a larger size, carrying 6 men each 2 of a medium size, carrying 5; 5 of a smaller size, carrying 5 or 4.

In the winter season, during calm frosty weather, these boats go from eight to ten miles from land, nearly due east from the Bell-rock; but in stormy weather, they rarely venture more than three or four miles from land. In summer, they go to a much greater distance, and fish upon two banks called the north and south shold; the first about eighteen, and the second twenty miles from land. Four of the larger boats in Ferryden... use in summer what are called the great lines, and sometimes go thirty miles to sea. The boats with the great lines take principally, halibut, skate, cod and ling,- the other boats, cod and haddocks. The halibut is in best season from April to July, and the skate during the same period. The ling is best during the summer months, and the cod during winter, or from November to July. The haddock is good all the year, except the months of March and April. During the summer season, there may be frequently seen at Ferryden fifteen or sixteen boats, after an absence of twelve or fourteen hours coming ashore in one day, with 1000 haddocks in each, which are currently sold in the Montrose market, or to retailers through the country, at little more than a farthing per lb.

  In 1855 there were 68 boats and 186 fishermen and the village population was around 1200.

 Cadgers from Brechin, Forfar, Coupar Angus, Dundee and Perth eagerly resorted to the port to get as much fish as they could carry away to their customers.  Haddock was the fish they mainly purchased and there might be about 12 of they vying for the catch at the height of the season. Andrew Douglas, incidentally, had no high opinion of these incoming fish merchants:

a more undeserving class are not to be met with ; and the filth, squalor, savagery, cheating, and lying with which they have become associated in the minds of all, will not be palliated by me. I have seen much of their cruelty to their poor dumb beasts, and little of their good dispositions to any one, unless their indirect services to the whisky shops be regarded as coming under that head. (p. 47.)

   He further describes their way of life (pp. 50-51):

Cadgers used to visit Ferryden from every quarter. They always lodged in a whisky-shop, and were invariably 'drouthy neebours.' When a cadger’s cart was loaded, there was always something given by the cadger, which was invariably spent on drink. Besides, cadgers would often spend a week in the public—house waiting for the boats going out. When money was at command, treating was a very common thing; and on the principle of one good turn, real or imaginary, deserving another, the publicans reaped a good harvest from the alternating fortunes of the fishers and their customers. The cadgers uniformly settled with the boat’s crews in the public-house; and all these things considered, it would be wonderful indeed if the fisher population could have escaped from the whirlpool of intemperance.

   The coming of the railways and improvements in fish curing which meant they could more easily be transported meant the end of the cadgers' way of life.

  For the more stable elements in the village, drinking was also  a conspicuous element in daily life, though probably not more so than anywhere else.  When a new boat was built the family routinely ended up in the public house for celebrations.  At one time there were six 'whisky shops' in the settlement, but that number decreased over time. (Although there were 12 ale-house reported in 1845, this covered the whole parish of Craig.) There was also a tendency for young men to slip over the water from Montrose and cause drunken mischief at times, but riots do not seem to have erupted with any regularity. The mid Victorian temperance movement caught fire to a great extent later,even among fishing crews and seemed to over a sea change (pardon the pun) in the character of the place.

The 'Light Bread' Scandal

 While the following story told by Andrew Douglas in his book (p. 66) might to out of tune with the tenor of this post, it has to be included because it's irresistible.  An unnamed baker in Ferryden was so anxious that his raw materials should stretch as far as possible and went to extreme lengths to make them last.  One day he was selling a loaf to a customer when the shop parrot (who would be banned by health and safety regulations now) sang out: 'Light bread! Light bread!'  The lady was amused, paid for her bred and asked what it meant.  The baker assured her, 'Puir chat

terin’ thing! ye wud hardly ken, and we need care as little, fat he says, ma’am.'  When the woman got home she weighed her loaf and found that it was short.  He gave her a replacement, but the bird called out again.  She made him weigh the second loaf, then all the other loafs. All were under weight.  She got her money back.

   After the customer went, the baker conjectured that his reputation was in ruins.  He took immediate violent revenge on the poor parrot and threw its mangled body into the ash pit behind his premises.  However, the parrot revived, shook its feathers, then managed to stand up in a wobbly manner.  Just then he saw a great, filthy old pig (a creature he'd never see before) rooting about in the midden, accompanied by a litter of similarly bedraggled piglets.

   The poor parrot looked at them and said, 'Here, did ye happen to say anything aboot the light bread?'

The Religious Revival at Ferryden

   In view of what happened several decades later the state of religious observance in the village in the 1820s is surprising.  According to Andrew Douglas, there was no public place of worship in the village and church attendance was low.  Women in particular were prone to state that the demands of the family meant they could not observe the Sabbath.  The first steps to remedy this was the ministration of Dr Brewster who set up a regular service in the village each Sunday. The real change in Ferryden came following the beginning a regional religious phenomenon, a religious revival in the north-east which had its peak in the years between 1858 and 1862.   

   As detailed in an article by D. W. Bebbington ('Contrasting Worldviews in Revival: Ferryden, Scotland, in 1859', Evangelical Review of Theology, 31 (1), pp. 43-59.), lay preachers from Montrose infliltrated into Ferryden in late 1859, followed by a charismatic evangelist, Hay Macdowall Grant, and took the village by storm.  According to Bebbington, 'Sightseers flocked to Ferryden, earnest lay evangelists made a beeline for the village and ministers were drafted in from outside to preach and counsel the anxious.'  The inhabitants were strongly, physically gripped by lucid, physical transformations via were manifested in their daily life.  When a fisherman was baiting his line he experienced a wave of celestial music and then felt an overwhelming awareness of the presence of Christ in his boat.  Not a few other people had full-scale religious visions within their own homes.

   The close-knit community meant that the religious fervour was contagious and brought scenes, certainly in private, which were communicated like a form of mania.  The strength of women in the community meant that they were often key in persuading men folk to embrace a new intensity of religion.  The near hysterical atmosphere was so intense that, inevitable, it could not be sustained and the local Free Church, which had hitherto been dominant in Ferryden, took measures to calm the population.  So soon the village, like the raging sea, became calm and serene once more.

   

Previous Posts Mentioning Ferryden

For a discussion of the superstitions in Ferryden and other fisher villages see Fisher Folk(lore) and also The Slippery World of Superstition.

For Bull Waast, a 19th century wise man mentioned by Douglas, see The Later Witches.

A brief mention of Ferryden's mutual loathing of its neighbour Usan is mentioned in Place Rivalries Part 1.

Other Sites of Interest

Apart from the Ferryden Online website marked in the column to the right, another resource is the website dedicated to an old Ferrydenner, Davy Dick.