GORDON, Jean ¹

   User ID: W718.

  General Notes:

"GORDON
JEAN
GEORGE GORDON/
F
12/08/1739
180/ 10 43
Clatt"

from Births and Baptisms




Highland Harry
Burns said he picked up the chorus of this song - 'My Harry was a gallant gay' - 'from an old woman in Dumblane; the rest of the song is mine'.

Peter Buchan states that: 'the original song related to a love attachment between Harry Lumsdale, the second son of a Highland gentleman, and Mrs Jeanie Gordon, daughter to the Laird of Knockespock, in Aberdeenshire. The lady was married to her cousin, also a Gordon, a son of the Laird of Rhynie; and some time after her former lover having met her and shaken her hand, her husband drew his sword in anger, and lopped off several of Lumsdale's fingers, which Highland Harry took so much to heart that he soon after died'.

Burns gave the song a Jacobite slant in accordance with his personal views.

To the tune 'Highland Watch's Farewell to Ireland', from Stewart's Reels 1762, the song appeared in the Scots Musical Museum in 1790.

from Burns Encyclopaedia website


For an alternative slant on the story and song see http://www.fresnostate.edu/folklore/ballads/Ord427.html regarding

Harry Lumsdale's Courtship:

"DESCRIPTION: 'First when Harry cam' to Clatt,' he asks bonnie Jean, 'wilt thou go Up to Auchindoir we'me?' Jean and her mother hesitate. Harry decides to turn to Betty Brown. After he leaves, Jeannie says, 'O for him back again!'

AUTHOR: unknown

EARLIEST DATE: 1908 (GreigDuncan4)

KEYWORDS: love courting mother rejection separation

FOUND IN: Britain(Scotland(Aber))

REFERENCES (4 citations):
Greig #32, p. 3, ('O Jeannie will ye go, Go to Auchindoir wi' me?') (1 fragment)
GreigDuncan4 766, 'Harry Lumsden,' GreigDuncan Addenda, 'Harry Lumsden' (2 texts)
Ord, pp. 427-429, 'Harry Lumsdale's Courtship' (1 text)

ADDITIONAL: James Hogg and William Motherwell, editors, The Works of Robert Burns (Glasgow, 1841 ('Digitized by Google')), Vol. II, pp. 197-200, ('First when Harry came to Clatt') (1 text) Roud #6186

ALTERNATE TITLES:
Highland Harry

NOTES: Ord describes this as the original for Burns's 'My Harry Was a Gallant Gay' (aka 'Highland Harry.')

This strikes me as unlikely. The common material is a single verse, near the end of Ord's text and clearly not integral to it; it seems more likely that 'Highland Harry' is a genuine traditional song and that Ord's obscure poem has picked up its chorus. - RBW

Burns says, 'The chorus I picked up from an old woman in Dunblane; the rest of the song is mine.' The quote is from Cunningham [probably The Complete Works of Robert Burns 1835] in Hogg and Motherwell. That 'chorus' is from 'Harry Lumsdale's Courtship.'

Hogg and Motherwell tell the story that Harry 'was the second son of a Highland chieftain who came down to the Garioch, a district in Aberdeenshire, and made love to Miss Jeanie Gordon, daughter to the laird of Knockhaspie. This lady ... was afterwards married to her cousin Habichie (??) Gordon [who later 'lopped off several of Lumsdale's fingers' when the couple accidentally met, leading to Lumsdale's death]. - BS "

from fresnostate website ^{1 2}

  Research Notes:

JEAN GORDON AND HARRY LUMSDEN

Jean Gordon, daughter of the Laird of Knockespock, is said to have been linked to the song by Robert Burns called "My Harry was a Gallant Gay" or "Highland Harry". Her husband is also said to have been a Gordon, some say of Rhynie, others of Avochie. The Harry Lumsdale of the tale is linked with Harry Lumsden of Auchindoir then 10th of Cushnie. If he was the gallant, then this Jean Gordon was born too late to have been his lover when they were both young. It could of course have been an earlier Jean Gordon, niece of his mother Agnes Gordon, but as yet we have no firm evidence of her.