Barrowsgate

Category: Writings

  • This Show Business

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    The chemist tells Barrowsgate about his recent visit to a cattle show. Note: This was published in the Mearns Leader in 1956. There do not appear to be any other articles by Barrowsgate published around this time (he was 74 by then).

  • Stranger Aboard

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    This is a ghost story set on the Fraserburgh trawler “Rose of Faithlie”. Newly-wed crewman Jimmie is on board, and the captain sees strange apparitions. The voyage ends in tragedy. Unpublished manuscript below.

  • Mutual Consideration

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    Barrowsgate attended the Drumnadroggit Mutual Swaree but out of discretion and respect for the attendees, he won’t say a word about it. Note: This was published in the Huntly Express in 1950 (date unknown at present)

  • Rolling Stone

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    This is an unusual “story” consisting of a number of anecdotes based on Barrowsgate’s experiences as a “rolling stone”. ​ He recounts various adventures, including travelling to see a heavyweight championship fight in Reno, Nevada, by signing up as a railway navvy. ​ He shares anecdotes about seeing a loaf of bread impaled on a…

  • Sacramento River Dredging

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    This is an account of Barrowsgate’s own experiences as a dredgerman on the Sacramento River in 1911. ​ He found work on a steam dredger in the Lisbon Reclamation District. The dredger was a large vessel used to deepen the navigation channel and raise the riverbank to prevent flooding. ​ Barrowsgate describes the challenging and…

  • Black Bart

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    In this unpublished story, written around 1950, Barrowsgate shares a table at a Sacramento restaurant with an elderly gentleman who proceeds to tell him about his early life in and around the goldfields of California and Nevada. Barrowsgate asks the old man if he had ever come across the infamous bandit “Black Bart”, famous for…

  • A Link with Drake

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    In “A Link with Drake”, Barrowsgate describes how (in his travels) he would often wander far off the beaten track and how, in the summer of 1911, he had come across something unusual in a clearing in woodland near Bodega in Sonoma County, California. It was a heavy brass plate at the foot of a…

  • The Broons Pairty

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    In this short playlet (date unknown), Kirsty Broon has invited four “society ladies” from Dubbytoon round for a meal to celebrate the elevation of her husband Jeck Broon to Head Scaffie (roadsweeper) of Dubbytoon. Just before they arrive, Jeck confesses that he has lost one of his collar studs and thinks it has landed in…

  • Mairry in Haste

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  • Fitey Steps Out

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    Due to heavy snow, Fitey’s train home from the market isn’t running. He goes into the pub a few times to check the time on their clock before setting off for home on foot along the railway track. Stopping for a smoke after a few miles, he turns his back to the wind to light…