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William
Schomberg Robert Kerr, 8th Marquis of Lothian who celebrated
his majority on 12th August 1853 by instituting the
first Jedburgh Border Games |
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The first person to moot the idea of having an athletic
games event was probably Mr Thomas Oliver, sawyer of Jedburgh.
While chatting with ex-provost Miller in the High Street
one evening in 1852, he remarked to the effect that there
may be an opportunity to have a Games here next year. Both
were enthusiastic admirers of athletics and accustomed to
conducting such sports during the summer evenings in the
town. They both managed to get other kindred spirits interested
in the matter, and were not long in putting the idea into
a business like form. Contests held almost nightly during
the summer evenings, at the Anna and at Abbey Bridge End
Green, adjoining Barton's Ropery may be said to have been
the immediate precursors of the Border Games. Sums of up
to sixpence could be won by youths testing their running
prowess in those early days, and the modest prizes collected
from a willing crowd of spectators, were as hotly contested
then, as the much prized cups and other trophies presented
to the most successful competitors nowadays. The first 'Jethart
Games' were held on Friday 12th August 1853 to mark the
coming of age of the 8th Marquis of Lothian. The original,
memorandum quotes, "acting under a desire to give the
greatest possible amusement in the least harmful manner,
the commitee of Management for the occasion resolved to
celebrate the majority of the Marquis of Lothian by Border
Games". Early records recall that a procession left
the Market Place for the Dunion Games field where Peggy
Lockie set up her krame at the Toonheid selling gingerbread
horses. The band was made up for the occasion, and consisted
of Thomas Main, shopkeeper (bugler), James Hopkirk, painter
(cornet), James Turnbull, tailor (trombone) James Balmer,
skinner (cornopean), Wm. Aitchison, tailor, and Walter Ferguson,
shoemaker (drummers), James Cook, High Street (fiddler).
The various trades with their banners and flags, also turned
out and paraded the streets in the morning to the music
of the band, and also accompanied the band to the moor.
The selling of liquor on the Games field at the Dunion moor
was forbidden, but usually at some of the krames, the old
wife in charge had a black bottle hidden away in addition
to the lemonade she was selling on her stall. Besides the
black bottles alluded to, a publican, who was tenant of
'The Burgess Slap,' near the Dunion Toll conveyed liquor
there in greybeards and sold gills and glasses all afternoon.
This early attempt at prohibition was therefore, quite ineffective.
Family parties gathered together for a picnic lunch, which
frequently consisted of rabbit pie washed down with 'treacle
wheugh' from Mary Dawson's establishment in the town, the
rabbits themselves, no doubt having come only several days
before, from the self same moor where they were now being
eaten. It was estimated that no less than five to six thousand
gathered on the Dunion moor for the first Games event held
on 12th August 1853. A definitive report of this event and
the first preparation of the festivities in the town for
the occasion is given on the Founding Story page of the
website, in the book entitled 'The Marquis of Lothian's
Majority'. Each year, at half past nine in the morning,
in pursuance of arrangements, the Trades of the Burgh, and
others carrying the banners emblematic of their crafts,
assembled upon the rampart and forming into procession marched
soon after, accompanied and followed by an immense concourse
of excited and enthusiastic people, through the Market Place,
up Castlegate, and onward to the moor ground. They were
preceeded by the Jedforest Band, and by St John's Fife Band,
who alternately rang out merry strains. The ground was reached
about 10 o'clock, and when every requisite being was comfortably
adjusted, the proceedings commenced. In those early years
it is said that you could get gye fu' for ninepence. It's
probably just as well that the return journey was down hill
all the way at the end of an eventful day.
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1859
map of Jedburgh showing the Dunion Games Field at bottom
left and the new venue at Lothian Park, closer to the
town centre introduced in 1878.
(Click on image to view) |
Games were held annually on the Dunion Moor until 1878,
with the exception of the year 1870, when owing to the untimely
death of the 8th Marquis of Lothian, they were abandoned
as a mark of respect. At this period the annual event had
not been so successful as the managers wished, and the decline
in public interest was attributed to the great distance
of the Games ground from the railway station, there being
many complaints from competitors regarding the laboriousness
of the ascent to the Dunion, while the holding of the event
on a Friday was also considered unsuitable. At a public
meeting on 8th June 1878, a recommendation by the Managers
that the Games, instead of being held on the Dunion Moor,
be held in the Lothian Park, which had been given by Lord
Lothian, the 9th Marquis, in April of that same year for
the use of the local inhabitants, was almost unanimously
adopted. It was also decided that the Games be held on a
Saturday instead of Friday. The first Border Games in the
Lothian Park were accordingly held on Saturday July 13th
1878, set in the shadow of Jedburgh Abbey and bordered by
the river Jed, and the meetings were held there annually
from that date.
When the Crimean War was raging there was a Jethart Games,
and the famous sports meeting was in full swing when our
lads marched off to two World Wars. The Games were an old,
well tried, and favourite conversation topic in sporting
circles all over the country. During both World Wars, Jethart
followers of sport in the trenches, in shelters or on the
high seas could find an infallible means of making each
other homesick by having a blether about the great Dan Wight
and the wresting Thomsons and Bob Douglas, Henry Miller
(M. Henry), winner of the Powderhall sprint in 1913 or Jim
Dodds (R. James), a Games stalwart and the first Scot to
win the famous Morpeth sprint. At the conclusion of the
Second World War the venue once again changed in 1946, moving
to Riverside Park, home of Jedforest Rugby Football Club
where it has remained ever since. Generations now will still
remember the great American sprinter Barney Ewell who, after
winning a silver medal at the 1948 Olympic Games in London,
ran at Jethart Games in 1950 winning the 120 yards sprint
from scratch in the record time of 11 and 6/16ths seconds
setting up a new all-comer British Professional record.
The popular E. Sampson of British Honduras competed regularly
at Jedburgh and ran 2nd to Barney Ewell in the 1950 sprint
final. Sampson received a 10 yards start from Ewell. We
mustn't forget, the legendary Albert Spence from Blyth who
beat Ewell in the invitation race the same year. Spence
received 1½ yards from Ewell. Many will recall John
Dawson(J. Franklin), the 1952 summer Powderhall champion,
British 880 yards champion Rob Barr, John Steede six times
British 400m champion, Rob Hall another British champion,
and sprinters Keith Douglas, a prolific champion over all
sprint distances, and Tom Finkle, British champion and winner
of the Powderhall New Year sprint in 1989, being the first
Jethart winner since M. Henry took the title in 1913. Incidentally,
Tom was a distant relative by marriage to the legendary
Dan Wight, the first Powderhall winner in 1870, who also
dead heated from scratch in 1876.
Since the resumption of the Games at Riverside Park after
the Second World War, many local athletes have made their
mark in the 'Jethart Sprint', including J. Clements in 1947
Addie Elliot (E.Adams) in 1948, Johnny Blaikie (J.Scott)
in 1957, John Steede in 1963 and 1972, Rob Bannon in 1966,
Nicky Burrell in 1979, Harry Hogg in 1986, Tom Finkle in
1998, Michael Yule in 1999, Scott Elliot in 2000 and 2005,
Doug Moffat in 2001, Charlie Cochrane in 2002 and the first
woman ever to win the event, Karen Cochrane in 2004. The
Jedburgh Border Games are now very much part of the Jethart
Callant's Festival, which started in 1947, festival Friday
being the day prior to the Games Day. Always held on the
second Saturday in July, celebrations begin with the firing
of a cannon in the Market Place at 6am, that annual early
morning ceremony, that uniquely identifies Jethart Games
from every other gathering of its kind, and heralds the
start of the "Blue Riband Event" of Scotland's
summer sports circuit.
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