Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)

Subject: The Clearances (Silly Wizard)
From: GUEST
Date: 23 Aug 02 - 10:37 AM

There was a thread on this song some time ago but I can't find it when I do a search, although I did find the lyrics. There was quite a bit of information but as I remember I still couldn't quite figure out what was meant by "the woods of germany grows in rows o'er the broken hearted" - where did the reference to Germany come from? Also anybody know who the cruel Gillander was? I do remember the debate about who actually did the clearing and it was concluded that it wasn't really fair to just blame it on the much maligned English. Can anybody contribute more to the subject? I remember the previous thread still left me with questions.

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: MMario
Date: 23 Aug 02 - 10:46 AM

previous thread

I can do a blickie - but I don't know anything about the song or the subject.

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: GUEST,maryrrf
Date: 23 Aug 02 - 11:12 AM

That was me, by the way, that posted the question. A technical one here - I typed in "Clearances" "Highland Clearances" etc. but I couldn't find that thread. Thanks, Mmario that's the one I was looking for. But I'd still like to hear more comments about the song if anybody has further insights.

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: GUEST,maryrrf
Date: 23 Aug 02 - 11:16 AM

Upon rereading the original thread I find some of my questions were already answered. Sorry my memory is really slipping. And I started that first thread too!

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: GUEST
Date: 23 Aug 02 - 05:59 PM

Harriet Beecher Stowe, who wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin, visited Scotland at the behest of American journalists who were perturbed at the plight of the Clearance refugees. She stayed with the Duke and the Duchess of Sutherland and wrote a book called Sunny Memories in which she 'found the people to be in good circumstance'. A Scottish emigrant to Canada, Donald Mcleod, wrote an answer called Gloomy Memories which is really worth a read. This was long before John Prebble's excellent Highland Clearances. I wrote a number of songs myself before Prebble's book, portraying villains like Patrick Sellar, the Duke and the Duchess of Sutherland and victims like Henny Munro, a soldier's widow, returning from the Peninsular wars who suffered more in Scotland than she did abroad. Cheers, Jim McLean

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: Jim McLean
Date: 24 Aug 02 - 04:20 AM

I'm sorry I forgot to set my cookie for the above note. Jim McLean

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: Teribus
Date: 24 Aug 02 - 05:02 AM

Dear Guest,

The reference to the phrase

"the woods of germany grows in rows o'er the broken hearted"

May refer to conifer plantations in places where people used to live. But this happened long after the 'Clearances' took place.

Gillander, if memory serves me correctly was a Factor, like Patrick Sellar mentioned by Jim McLean in his post above.

You are correct in your comment regarding 'English' involvement - the main culprits were the major Highland landowners and lowland Scots. The first 'Clearances' took place along the Anglo-Scottish borders shortly after James the VIth succeeded to the throne of England in 1603. The clearances in the Highlands began later in the 1600's when the existing Highland landowners realised that there was more money in cattle than in men. Cattle breeding (almost totally for beef) was later replaced by sheep farming, which in turn gave way to game (grouse, pheasant, deer and salmon fishing), each change required fewer and fewer men. Forestry then was introduced during the Great War.

The funny thing was that those cleared off the land, once they arrived in Canada, America and Australia had no qualms about driving the native owners of the land so that they could benefit themselves.

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: Maryrrf
Date: 24 Aug 02 - 09:23 AM

Jim, I've heard many of your songs and frankly thought they were traditional until told otherwise or seeing them attributed to you. It's an honor to meet you even if it is in cyberspace!

The 'wuds' of Germany still puzzles me. I just got a version of the song by Ian Benzies (ex Old Blind Dogs). HE sings "The wuds o'Germany rouse and carouse oer the broken hearted". Now "wud" means "mad" or "crazy" in scots, right? - could this mean that there were German mercenary troops in the Highlands possibly serving with the British army ? I could imagine soldiers getting out of hand as they drove people off their land. Sorry to keep hammering on this but I really want to know what that line means.

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 24 Aug 02 - 09:59 AM

To be frank that sounds a little far-fetched, and there is no record of any military involvement in the particular event presumably being referred to. Wouldn't it be better to continue this discussion in the earlier thread, to avoid unnecessary repetition?

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Aug 02 - 10:39 AM

Not quite the same subject but I'm iterested in stories or songs concerning those Scots who settled in Nova Scotia. This is a song soon to be released by Steve Wright of Guysborough County, Nova Scotia. It has a wonderfull melody and story.

"Touch not the Cat"

Father dear Father it's your only son, who ran to the army for adventure and fun. Fighting yanks for King George in a battle not won. So he gave us land north, Nova Scotia.

Now my land I have cleared it and I've built me a home. I have pulled root and burnt stump, pulled out many a stone. And at the end of each day I hear Father to Son "touch not the cat but a glove"

CHRS When the moon rises up on the water. That's when I'm thinking of you. For it lights up the bay to my home far away. Dear old Scotland, the highlands and you.

Oh Mother dear Mother you can hear me I pray. I have married a young lass from New England way. And she's born us three children. Yes I've named them true. One for Father, myself and for you.

Oh my Marion loves me and I love her true. We work hard together, do the best for our brood. And she loves 'em and scrubs 'em I know you'd approve. She's the salt of the earth just like you.

Repeat Chrs..

High on a hilltop, over looking the bay. Young william MacIntosh kneels there to pray. For he longs for his homeland his parents his friends. But he knows he'll not see them again.

Final Chrs.. And the moon rises up on the water. And a scar burns deep in his soul. Many lives has the cat. Much beauty much love. But touch not the cat but a glove.

Steve Wright Socan

regards, Jim

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: Jim McLean
Date: 24 Aug 02 - 11:11 AM

Touch not the cat without a glove is the motto of the Clan Chattan, Clan of the cats. Jim Mclean

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: GUEST,Ian Macintyre
Date: 24 Aug 02 - 08:34 PM

Hello! I don't know if I missed the first of this, but my mother's people were MacGillivrays, also of Clan Chattan, along with the Macintoshes, and a few other clans. As for the line referring to Germany, I thought it had to do with the House of Hanover (i.e. "German Geordie", et al.)

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: Maryrrf
Date: 24 Aug 02 - 09:24 PM

Guest, I see no other explanation that make sense of these words. Unless somebody thinks of something better I'll assume that's what it is.

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 24 Aug 02 - 09:32 PM

That's what I suggested in the earlier thread mentioned above, though it would be anachronistic.

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Aug 02 - 12:52 AM

Hello Maryrrf,

Mr. Mclean is correct as it is the very indroduction Wright uses to introduce the song.

Jim

Subject: RE: Help - The Clearances (Andy M. Stewart)
From: Teribus
Date: 27 Aug 02 - 03:49 AM

In the previous thread linked above Dita contributed the following

"This song was written by Andy M. Stewart of Silly Wizard, in the late 1970's. Maryrrf - The "Woods of Germany" is correct, that verse is the only peice of lyrics that appear on the cover of "So Many Partings." "This is a lament for the glens of Scotland, seen through the eyes of a man standing in a ruined croft" I think Malcolm is spot on, Andy has gone for emotion at the expense of facts, and in this case many of the historical facts are wrong."

From that I get the impression that the man standing in the ruined croft is doing so in 1970. As such the song spans the events of some 280 years.

If you are trying to compress that into a shorter time frame it is little wonder that you are having difficulty making sense of the lyrics.

In one of your postings above you say

"I just got a version of the song by Ian Benzies (ex Old Blind Dogs). HE sings "The wuds o'Germany rouse and carouse oer the broken hearted". Now "wud" means "mad" or "crazy" in scots, right? - could this mean that there were German mercenary troops in the Highlands possibly serving with the British army ? "

From your first post you asked for the meaning and context of the line

"the woods of germany grows in rows o'er the broken hearted".

From the Ian Benzies line, we get the meaning that "The mad or crazy of Germany stir and drunkenly sing over the broken hearted".

No German mercenary forces were employed by the government for service in Scotland during the period in question. Military connections due to the Hanover succession included use of Hessian troops in America during the American War of Independence (1776) and Hanoverian troops who joined the King's German Legion during Napoleonic times (1803 - 1815). The KGL operated under some pretty strange conditions considering whose side they were fighting on - they were only allowed to be stationed on the Isle of Wight and could not land on the mainland except for immediate embarkation (usually to Portugal and Spain).

Taking the original quote which refers to woods growing in rows, that puts in my minds eye a man standing on the site of a ruined croft in 1970 and seeing a commercial forest planted with German Pine.