Twathree thochts on Ballygowan

Raymond Patterson

“It’s guid enough kickin’ Remon’, but ye’re no geein uz enough o’ the ba’,” said John as the two of us kicked a ball around in the low fiel’. John Crawford lived in the farm next to us — only 50 yards away — but in the next townland. We lived in Ballygowan townland, the Crawfords in Magherascouse, Parish of Comber. This is my earliest memory of my Ulster-Scots heritage.

I did not realise in my childhood how much Scots influence there was in the area of my home. It was taken for granted as the natural way of life. Ballygowan Village had its Brae, Ballyknockan its Glen, Carrickmannon and Magherascouse had a Burn, and practically all the townlands in the vicinity had their Knoweheids.

Cattle were “kye” or “bastes”, hens were “fowl”, bogs were “mosses”. Schoolchildren were “scholars”, the school principal “the maister”, and the Presbyterian church “the Meetin’ Hoose.” The language of the metrical psalms and the James IV Bible was in constant everyday use.

Benign sarcasm or banter was in evidence — the “New Light” influence of Moneyreagh Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church was succinctly summed up as:

The economic geography of the area was neatly covered by the rhyme:

“Fair fa’ ye” — An Ulster-Scots Greeting

Who doesn’t know Burns’s “Fair fa’ your honest soncie face” in his address To a Haggis? He wrote this about 1785, but 50 years earlier William Starrett of Strabane wrote “Fair fa’ ye then” to his friend Allan Ramsey. James Orr of Ballycarry had the goodwives of that village proclaim to the returning rebels of 1798 — “Guid God! Is’t you? Fair fa’ ye!”. Bob Huddleston of Moneyreagh in County Down, wrote in 1844 “Fair fa’ ye auld Cloots!” (Greetings Satan!) in a satirical poem about the Presbyterian controversies at that time.