The Penders/Borthwicks
The Penders/Borthwicks - 1919 to 1935
When the young men came home from the War the normal young life recommenced. How could they get to meet the Lassies? The Lassies thoughts were not dissimilar, how to meet the Lads? The answer was the same in each case. So Billy Primrose's Dancing Classes became a popular meeting place for the young of the area. Billy was a stern disciplinarian as he danced about the young couples with his half-sized fiddle under his chin exhibiting the classic steps. "No One-stepping" (Quickstep?) was his cry as the youngsters showed each other the latest dance steps. As far as Billy was concerned the steps of the Lancers were what he was teaching and anything else was forbidden. (There is or was until recently, a classical violinist by name William Primrose; I sometimes wonder if there is some relationship with the dancing master). Of course John Pender and his mate Alex Taylor joined up for lessons with Billy Primrose as did May Borthwick and her cousin Sarah Crooks McLean, and it wasn't long before these two pairs changed partners. May had finally found her tall dark-headed Cameron even if he had swapped the kilt for working trousers by this time.
May and John were married in the George A Clark Town Hall on the 21st of June 1923, some thirty years after her mither and faither. Sarah McLean was May's Best Maid but for some reason John's Best Man was Johnnie Marr. Perhaps Alex Taylor had a prior engagement. Some three years later Alex and Sarah were also married.
May and John set up home upstairs in the three bedrooms of No.57 Glenpatrick Road. Grandma and Grandda Borthwick slept in one of the box beds in the kitchen and George and Bon slept in the other. Dan Hendry the Village Plumber was called in to install a second WC under the stairs. So with one of the pair of sinks in the scullery doubling as a wash-hand basin, and a gas ring set up in the smallest bedroom upstairs, the two households were effectively completely separate. (Young John Burnett had been known to his school chums as "Bon Jorthwick" and the family carried on the nickname; in "Bothkenny" he was always known as "Bon". As far as Iain and I were concerned he was always Uncle Bon.)
Grandma Borthwick was by now having bouts of illness with failing kidneys, so May soon became the boss over the men in the house; her Father, her Husband, her two Brothers, George and Bon, and from 19th of May 1924 Baby Iain Allan Burnett. George had started work in the Carpet Field round about 1916 as a weaver's helper and once he reached maturity he became a Carpet weaver following his Great-grandfather Daniel McQueen.
Jake Borthwick had become one of the founder members of the Elderslie Golf Club. Young Bon soon became an enthusiastic member of the club. By this time Bon had started work in a butchers' shop in Paisley so he was invariably the last of the menfolk home from work. The other three men had had their tea by that time and were snoozing comfortably in the summer evenings when the door would be flung back on its hinges with the cry "Are Yese a' deed in this hoose. Is naebody coming oot for a hit at the ba'?" Thus one or more of the snoozers was encouraged to change their shoes, grab their golf bags and accompany young Bon on to the sixth hole which bordered on the back fence of "Bothkenny". They would play round to the 13th before darkness made it impossible to see the ball, still less the flag.
John Pender had by now left Campbell & Calderwood and had found work with Doultons'. However a few years after that he was either paid off or left of his own free will and moved to Shanks' of Barrhead still as a Pattern Maker. He stayed with Shanks' until he retired in 1962 having in the early 50's become a rate fixer and one of the office yins.
Grandma Borthwick's kidneys were deteriorating rapidly in the late 20's and come the 20th of March 1931 she died in Bothkenny of Chronic Nephritis. That same week Grandda Borthwick came home on the Friday evening and handed over his unopened pay packet to young May. This was something that John Pender had already been doing of course just as he had seen his father do. But Grandda handing over his pay to his daughter was tantamount to handing over the Field marshal’s baton. May was now the head of the house! George and Bon were also expected to do the same, which of course they did. May was thus the Treasurer and Financial Director of the household. The menfolk were handed back their weekly pocket money and May was expected to run the house on what was left over.
Burnett Borthwick was born in the back bedroom of "Bothkenny,' on the 8th of September 1931, and shortly thereafter May got some help around the house from Anna Harkins, a wee catholic wifie from Johnstone, who stayed as May's "daily" till a bit before the second war. Anna was so much part of the household that I have no clear memory of her in the house, she was just 'there'.
One story concerning Anna Harkins indicates how the Catholics, especially the Irish Catholics in Johnstone, in those days treated their priests almost as demigods. The priests from the Paisley diocese were in the habit of coming out to Elderslie Golf Club for their weekly exercise. They would strip off their cassocks and dog collars in the clubhouse and play their golf in their black trousers white shirts and black braces. One day my Mother noticed the priests on the sixth tee. "Come quick, Anna" she called "Come and see your Fathers!" Anna came running to see this phenomenon. 'Oh my" she said "they're just like ordinary men!"
The household remained the same till July 1935 when Bon got married to Agnes Couperwhite, (Aunt Nancy), in The Picture House Cafe. This is one of my earliest memories, of being dragged on my hunkers along the shiny "slipporined" wooden dance floor. My other memory of about that time, (though it must surely have been somewhat later), was thinking that as uncle Bon was 29; it was hardly worth his while getting married!
In February the following year Grandda died of heart trouble. Whilst I have no living memory of Grandda Borthwick, I have a distinct memory of seeing him lying in state in his coffin in the front room. I also recall his wareroom girls coming to the house, being invited in to the front room and kneeling beside the coffin and (I thought) whispering to each other. It wasn't till many years later that it occurred to me that they were in fact Catholics saying their rosaries. Oh the innocence of youth!
