Sackcloth.No ashes.

Paxton's a fine snug place, Robin Adair;
It's a wondrous couthie place, Robin Adair;
Let Whitadder rin a spate
or the wind blaw at ony rate,
Yet I'll meet thee on the gait Robin Adair

runs the 1730 version of the traditional air which is all about Paxton and the promise of 'hae a night o'glee' -presumably in one of the many local taverns which preceded The Cross Inn.

According to the Rev David Leslie who was Minister of the Parish and lived in the (now Old) Manse for 60 years both Paxton and Hutton were large villages in earlier times and rather dangerous ones as they were 'always in the eye of raiding hordes' -Reivers or invading English armies. That their size is much reduced since those halycon days may have something to do with the fact that in 1482 the Duke of Gloucester burned Edrington, Paxton and Hutton. 15 years later after James IV failed to capture Norham the Earl of Surrey destroyed Hutton Castle no doubt inflicting collateral damage on the two villages as well. In 1542 the Duke of Norfolk demolished Paxton once again causing considerable problems for the Paxton family who owned land on both sides of the Border subsequently much reduced in acreage by successive episodes of being on the wrong side of the argument at the wrong time. That family by the time of the Union had lost their eponymous patrimony and had only a few acres in Auchencrow to their name. A later member of the family Sir Joseph Paxton, no longer with any local building ambitions-not even Knowe's Close, designed the Crystal Palace-not too lucky with that as well.

Paxtonians were the backbone of the local Tweed fishing:

The best fish in the Tweed, Robin Adair,
shall be thy weelwar'd meed, Robin Adair

But if he did not fancy fish;


And welcome you shall be Robin Adair
To everything that you see
Thou shalt carve the Goose for me
and o'our roast pig you shall prie, Robin Adair

Its worth noting that even in those days Fishwick (fish village) was a troublesome spot long before a bypass was thought necessary. In 1649 10 local fishermen had to appear as penitents, dressed in sackcloth, at Hutton (literaly Wood-town) Church for fishing on Sunday: 'By fishing after the sun rising in the morning and before the sun set at night'

That is still an offence today. Punishable by a fine. On par with trying to buy alchohol at the Co-op before 1pm.

But

Sackcloth optional.

Labels: Fishwick Bypass, Hutton, Lord Paxton

  ¶ 9:42 AM