Life of a local: Davie Doughty
FOR many years Whithorn fish and game dealer Davie Doughty travelled the highways and byways of Wigtownshire buying and selling the produce of the sea and the land.
Now, at the age of 85, and retired from business some 20 years, he and his wife Cathie live contentedly in their neat house in George Street, next to the shop that was run by three generations of his family.
Still looking not a day older than when he put down his gutting knife, Davie Doughty recently shared many of his memories of a long and happy life in Whithorn with Galloway Gazette reporter Louise Kerr.
His recollections here will give readers an insight into how much everyday life the Burgh town has changed in nearly a century.
Let's begin with with a trip down memory lane to the now sadly defunct Whithorn Railway Station.
The station, which stood at the bottom of the town, near where the fire brigade depot stands now, was a big part of the life blood of a fish and game business like Doughtys', as well as a route to the delights of Stranraer and Newton Stewart at the weekend.
Davie and Cathie both recalled the 'woopee train' on a Saturday night taking the youth of the area to the pictures in Stranraer on a Saturday night.
"Because the train went so slowly coming back into Whithorn many boys used to jump out at the crossings, before the platform, and walk home with out paying their fare," said Mr Doughty with a grin.
"I remember the ticket master was called Sam Allan, and I did hear of people cutting down a match box to the size of a railway ticket and handing that over at the station, because in the dark, he couldn't tell the difference!"
During the 1930's and 40's when food was in short supply there was a great demand for rabbit meat. As fish and game dealers Davie and his father would often load up the train with hundreds of rabbits caught locally, destined for England to feed the poor in the larger cities.
"We would often crate up 300 rabbits a day to take to the 3pm train, " he said, "in the industrial areas rabbit was a cheap meal.
"At that time, before myxomatosis (a viral disease fatal to rabbits that decimated numbers in the 60's), there was hundreds and hundreds of rabbits around here, from Glasserton to Monreith and right down to the shore.
"I had a wee lorry and I used to go round and collect them. There was a trapper in the area that used to go from farm to farm, so I used to know where to go to get the rabbits."
Rabbit meat was also a staple of the diet in rural area like Wigtownshire, but Davie and Cathie Doughty now bemoan the fact that the skills required to dealing with game are dying out.
"Not many people these days would know how to pluck and clean a pheasant, or make hare soup, when you have to drain and keep the blood to use to thicken the soup at the end," said Cathie Doughty.
But it was not only game that the Doughtys' used the train to transport out of Whithorn in vast quantities. The profusion of brambles that spring from the hedgerow in late summer and early autumn were eagerly gathered by many locals looking to supplement their meagre wages.
"I went round and collected the brambles the same way I collected the rabbits, said Mr Doughty, "then they were taken by train to the markets in Glasgow."
The brambles were measured in 'chips' and there was four pounds of brambles in a 'chip'. Looking back at his meticulous record books, Mr Doughty thought he had a record one day in 1957 when he collected 408 'chips - an amazing 1,632 lbs of brambles. But looking further back he discovered that his father had beaten him in 1935, collecting 411 'chips' in a single day.
The amount collected in the annual bramble harvest relied heavily on the weather. A good year, like 1957, brought a total of 3,381 'chips' collected from August to early October, but some years if the summer had been unsettled (like this summer) the number of 'chips' collected daily would go down to double figures.
"At the height of the brambling season I would be making three or four trips a day to the train." said Mr Doughty.
"But when the trains were stopped, we tried to get them to Glasgow by lorry, but it was not a success as they sometimes had to be transferred from one lorry to another they got spilled and spoiled.
"Then Robertsons the jam makers got in touch and asked if I would supply them in Glasgow. I said I would. They sent big barrels that held a hundredweight of fruit. Robertsons then arranged to collect them from me three times a week.
"But in the end it was a lot of work for little money, and they stared using a puree imported from Poland."
Boyhood Memories
As a resident in the town for over eighty years, with the exception of the years away in the Royal Air Force during the war, Mr Doughty has seen many aspects of life change and met many a character during that time.
"I clearly remember people Wilson Keith was the dustman in the town," recalls Mr Doughty, "every day he went about with his horse and cart lifting the bins, and sweeping the streets, and then taking everything away to the dump. There was just him, he managed to keep the whole town clean on his own
"Then there was Noah Henry who created the first picture house in Whithorn near the Park. It was just made of wood and canvas and frequently broke down. When that happened the boys just crawled out of the sides and went home!
"He then had another picture house beyond the Burgh boundary, down past the school then he built a third one down Kings Road, which he sold to a consortium of Whithorn business men.
"Johnny Mills and Johnny Stuart worked as the operators then, and one of the businessmen involved was a Mr Denton, who was instrumental in getting MGM films back after Henry had stopped buying them, probably because of the price."
Mr Doughty recalls that Mr Denton was fond of advertising this fact by exclaiming to his staff: "The lion is going to roar again down the Kings Road."
Latterly the Kings Road site was used for local dances and bingo nights.
Further back in his memory Mr Doughty can remember as a small boy watching silent movies in the town hall.
"There was a piano at the side that used to be played at the exciting bits, by a boy called Jim Douglas," he recalls.
A few years ago the two met when Jim Douglas came back to Whithorn for a visit.
"I told him a remembered him playing the piano for the silent films all those years ago. He left this area and I believe he became an eminent doctor of education," Mr Doughty recalls.
In Davy's childhood there was no plumbing in the houses in Whithorn, all the water for the house was brought by pail from a pump in the street.
"The pump I was sent to was around about where the dig shop is now," he remembers.
The famous Whithorn archaeology dig could have been started decades earlier as Davie Doughty remembers when the channels were dug for the water pipes, near to the present dig site, bones would be uncovered from time to time and occasionally brought into the school for inspection, before being returned to their resting place.
"When they were digging those tracks for the water pipes, I remember the foreman said to one of the diggers:"Come oot - jump back in. Come oot -jump in. Come oot - jump in."
The poor man followed these instruction a few times, mystified, before asking - why?
"Because you are taking more out on your boots than you are with a shovel," came the acid reply.
Davie continued: "We were one of the first houses in Whithorn to have water in the house. That meant an end to the toilet up at the top of the garden."
The memory of the 'little house' brought back to Davy Doughty's mind the time that many outhouses were being taken down, as mains water coursed through the town. The men removing the 'privvies' were told to take the timber to a bonfire site at the top of the town at Kevans Braes.
One outhouse had been lifted by the men and they were two or three steps down the path when a voice inside shouted "What the hell do you think you're doing?"
Whithorn in the thirties was a town lit up at dusk by the 'learies', men who came round to light the gas street light. The Doughtys' both recall the softer light given off by the gas, in contrast with the harsh glare of today's modern electric version.
Education
Davie Doughty was educated at Whithorn Primary School,still on the same site today, before going up to Whithorn Secondary School, where the Community Centre is now.
"You got three years of Secondary Education and you got a good grounding, I can tell you," he recalls.
"I remember clearly three years of French with Miss Waddell and at the end of it I could speak French like a native - of the Gambia!", he laughs.
"Many of the teachers were old, maiden ladies and they could be a bit strict. You got one warning if you misbehaved after that it was the strap.
One also doubled up as an art teacher, and she didn't stand any nonsense.
"We were all drawing one day when we heard some one coming into the room. Some boys looked round to see who it was, and what a telling off they got
"She shouted: "If the King himself comes through that door, you don't look round!"
Davie Doughty left the school at fourteen to work with his father in the family business but he still values the level of education he was given at Whithorn School and the life skills it gave him for the years ahead.
Heath Care
Before the National Health Service was introduced in 1947, doctors had to be paid for any treatment received. Mr and Mrs Doughty both remember those day well and even the names of two of the doctors who practiced in the town - Dr McDougall and Dr Marshall. The doctor not only undertook the business of keeping the population hale and hearty in body, they also undertook dentistry, regularly pulling teeth as well.
Cathie Doughty recalls that the bill for her mother's last confinement (pregnancy) was 12/6, and with her fathers weekly take home pay only 18/-, that was more that half the money used to keep the family for the week.
"You had to put money aside for things like that," said Cathie.
Translated into today's money 12/6 is just over 62 pence and 18 shillings is 90 pence.
Mr Doughty also recalls one unfortunate local doctor, who's demise led him to a very brief career as an undertaker.
He takes up the story: "Many, many years ago a Dr Craig was called out during a big snowstorm. On the back road to the Port his car got stuck and he got out and tried to push it, suffering a fatal heart attack in the process.
"His body was brought back to Whithorn, but the hearse for the funeral had to come from Port William, and it couldn't get through the snow.
"The men in the town had dug a path up to the church, and Muir the joiner had made the coffin."
The only thing for the good folk of Whithorn to do was improvise - so - Doughty's lorry, normally used to transport dead fish and game back and forth, was chosen as the makeshift hearse.
"I was asked to go and collect Dr Craig in our lorry, which had the advantage of a tarpaulin, and take him up to the church for his funeral.
"When I got home my father said to me "Did you get the job done?" I told him I had, and been given 2 for my trouble.
"My father told me to take it straight back.
"We're no taking money for doing that", he said.
"That was my very brief experience of undertaking," laughed Mr Doughty.
Read more about Davie Doughty's fascinating memories of a life in Whithorn in next week's Galloway Gazette. pic - davie doughty
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Weather for Newton Stewart
Tuesday 07 February 2012
Today
Sunny spells
Temperature: -0 C to 3 C
Wind Speed: 15 mph
Wind direction: South east
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