Change to our Programme for Sunday 25th November

Our next meeting is on Sunday, 25 November at 2.30pm in the Corn Exchange in Melrose, when Marjorie Gavin returns with a talk about Thomas Pringle of Blakelaw, near Kelso; a poet, traveller and anti-slavery campaigner - Thomas, in the early 19th century, was secretary of the Anti-Slavery Society and was famed for his poetry. Many people may not have heard of this Roxburghshire man but his story has many exciting ingredients including South Africa, Sir Walter Scott connections and politics !

The original planned talk on the 'Black Death' has been postponed due to unforeseen circumstances and may be re-scheduled for 2013.

As usual, the doors will open at 2.00pm and the talk starts at 2.30pm.

Admission is free and we’ll have usual sales tables and refreshments after the talk. I hope to see you there. Map.

Digging Up Your Roots Podcasts

I've already blogged about the new series of BBC Radio Scotland's popular Digging Up Your Roots family history programme.

I’ve now found out that podcasts of the Digging Up Your Roots programmes can be downloaded. The podcasts are available for 30 days after broadcast, so I think the first programme will be available until 7th February 2012, and the subsequent programmes correspondingly later.

The first programme includes one of our members, Marjorie Gavin, talking about Dr John Leyden, the famous poet and orientalist from Denholm. I’m still able to listen to last year’s Digging Up Your Roots podcasts so I’m presuming that once they’re downloaded you’ll be able to listen to them over and over again.

200th anniversary of the death of Dr John Leyden

August 2011 sees the 200th anniversary of the death of Dr John Leyden, the famous poet and Orientalist from Denholm in the Scottish Borders.

Dr Leyden was a great friend of Sir Walter Scott and it is said that after his death, Scott could never talk about Leyden without a tear in his eye. He really appears to have been a most remarkable man.

Over the next year, one of our members, Marjorie Gavin, who has served our Society both as Editor and as Chairman, and has transcribed births, marriages and deaths overseas from the Hawick Advertiser and Kelso Mail, hopes to visit as many groups and organisations as possible to talk about the life and achievements of the great Dr Leyden whose story deserves to be more widely known.

If you have any memorabilia or documents relating to Dr John Leyden that might assist her in this task please contact her by sending her a private message in our forum or replying to her forum topic.

More about Dr Leyden is in one of Marjorie's articles, The Life and Family of Dr. John Leyden.

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