by Joan Clarke
Aye, Miss Marion, I've heerd un
I've heerd the Dobby call,
I've heerd un, I've heerd un
An' gone out beyon' the wall
For Dobby he shouted loud
An' he called far out over th' sands
An' what he called an' what for he cried
Were a stone cairn built by our hands.
An' we built un th' stone cairn wheere
Th' cliffs stand at top of Cow's mouth
But it's never been right for un theere
An' he calls from th' West to the South
An' aye, Miss Marion, I've heerd un
An' you marn't say as I've not
I've heerd the Dobby call
An' wots more I'll tell you wot.
When John Taylor's father was sunk
I' th' quicksands far out i' th' bay
Then Dobby he wakkened an' cried
An' shouted as loud as he may
An' folk fainted becos' o' th' sound
An' thowt 'twas the judgement day
That his arms they be crossed on his breast
Yo' can ask Isaac Hall and the rest
Aye, Miss Marion, I've heerd un
I've heerd th' Dobby call all 'long th' bay.
Can any reader help clarify this poem? Who it is written by? Who the people mentioned in it are?
The poem itself is preserved in the Lancashire Record Office among the papers of Miss Enid Parkin of Silverdale (Ref. DDX/408). Did she write it herself? She was by way of being a poet. Filed with her papers is a booklet of poems, Country Songs by Enid Parkin, (Price 1/-, no date) but the Dobby is not among these printed poems, and the preserved copy of it is unsigned. In a note on a separate piece of paper she says that the Dobby was a sailor washed ashore and buried on the top of Jack Scout, but Silverdale inhabitants so far questioned have not heard of the legend, nor is it mentioned in David Peter’s ‘In and around Silverdale’.
It is plain from her papers that Enid Parkin was engaged in writing a history of Silverdale. There is an interesting Draft introduction for “The Story of Silverdale”, which begins “This story of Silverdale does not pretend to be a complete history of the village, but only a cursory survey of its folk and happenings so far as it has been possible to find out … The main intention is to try to tell Silverdale people of the twentieth century something that may hitherto have been by them generally unknown about the folk who in bygone days dwelt in this their domain; those who trod the self-same ground; saw the same lovely countryside: climbed the same limestone rocks … ”
It is very sad that after this admirable beginning so very little got beyond the stage of scattered notes. However, some are suggesting that at some time there was a more complete version of her history. It would be of great interest to know more about Miss Parkin. Does any reader remember her? Her papers show that in 1953 and 1954 she was living, or at any rate receiving post, at Bradshawgate Lots, Silverdale.
Other names crop up in the papers and might give a clue. An A. Monaghan, Townsfield, Silverdale wrote a letter in 1953 giving an account of her father, who was born in Bottoms Farm and was Vicar’s Warden for 48 years. Terence Frawley of “Westfield”, Silverdale, wrote in 1953 to give the date of the transfer of Lindeth from Warton to Silverdale Parish Council. An Edmund Lund wrote in 1954 asking her to contribute an article on her method of collecting material for the Parish Council Review of which he was Honorary Editor. A Mrs. Walker sent an account of her memories of the Rev. W. Sleigh, one of the most interesting finds among the papers. Please help.
We asked if any reader knew anything about this ‘dobby’. In response Dr Margaret Bainbridge has drawn attention to a nineteenth century description of other dobbies. It seems that our dobby was not alone.
Lancashire teemed with dobbies. Dictionaries think a dobby is either a dullard or a brownie, but Lancashire thinks otherwise. As an Ulverston man said in 1867 (and Ulverston was in Lancashire then) “Ghosts! Eigh, me lad, we’ve had plenty on ’em i’ Forness, but we’d anudder neam for ’em; we ol’as co’d em dobbies or freetnins. Here about U’Iston we’d t’ Punton Ho’ dobby, Lebby Beck dobby, Swing Gate dobby an’ we had ‘t King’s Arms dobby!1”
Natland had so many dobbies waiting to pounce on the unwary that it is surprising anyone ever went out after dark. Very odd creatures they seem to have been too. As well as conventional ghosts who clanked chains, there was a black cow that lay across the path. If you tried to jump over her, she rose up and charged you. There was a Versi-coloured Rabbit (an iridescent one, that is) which ran between your feet and tripped you up, and an Invisible Hand which would hold you fast all night, and the Mill Brigg Cotton-rogger (what’s that?) who upended you, leaving you upright but head down in a puddle. Not to mention the White Cat of Crakelt with no head and in its coffin2 The writer of the description recommended that after encountering these horrors you should go to “Mrs Dawson at the public house and recruit yourself with Natland-bonny” – where doubtless the locals would tell you still taller tales.
Dr Marshall supplied us with Edwin Waugh’s description of Silverdale in the nineteenth century. From it one can learn a little more about our very own dobbies. The company at the Victoria had plenty to say about them. There was a headless woman who haunted Jack Scout and the cave below, Cow’s Mouth. A local currier explained, “You see, sir, these dobbies have each their their own beat marked out, like so many policemen“. It seems the currier was a non-believer for he added that “the weather last back-end had been very hard for dobbies“, and that he was “afraid that some of them had not got over it.“. Perhaps that is why no-one seems acquainted with dobbies these days. Nor the fairies who danced in the Cove on moonlight nights, nor the big snig, the great eel, that haunted Silverdale tarn. It coiled itself round a rock on the shore, wearing away the rock by its grip, and then pounced on passing sheep. It was so big that when it was finally killed “there was nearly a pack of wool in the hollow of just one of its teeth3“.Notes
- John H. Nodal & George Milner, (1875), Glossary of the Lancashire Dialect, Publications of the Manchester Literary Society. ↩︎
- Lonsdale Magazine (1821) Vol.II, p95 (in bound volumes held at Lancaster Reference Library). ↩︎
- Waugh, Edwin (1861) Rambles in the Lake Country and its Borders, London, Whittaker and Co. Pp 231-232,235,237-238. ↩︎
Published in Mourholme Local History Society magazine issue 35 and 39 in 1999 and 2000
