About James
Campbell
1798 Irish Rebellion Study
James Campbell (1758 – 1818)
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James Campbell was born in the parish of Cairncastle, near Larne in County Antrim. His family seems to have made efforts to educate him, so he could read, write and count (skills not necessarily learned by poor people at the time).
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Campbell learned to weave linen, in the days before industrialisation, a trade that involved long hours of hard work for little pay. As a young adult, he left the family home and moved into Ballynure, about 8 miles away, where he found work as a journeyman weaver at the house of a farmer who had several weavers working for him. A journeyman weaver was a skilled craftsman who had completed an apprenticeship but was not yet considered a master weaver. They not only wove the linen cloth, but were also responsible for preparing the fibres and setting up the looms. Their pay could be calculated by the day or more usually by the ‘piece’ (hence the expression ‘piece-worker’).
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A few years on, Campbell married and set up home in Ballynure. After several years, the family moved to Ballybracken (usually called Ballybrecken by the locals), and raised seven children, three sons and four daughters.
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When the United Irishmen’s Rebellion broke out in 1798, suspicion fell on the 40-year old Campbell of being sympathetic to the rebels. He was arrested and all his papers were seized by the authorities. After a short time, he was set free for lack of evidence; however, his confiscated papers were never returned. This meant that most of his poems up to that stage of his life were lost. In reading the poems he wrote in the remaining 20 years, we cannot help but wonder whether there was more Ulster-Scots content in the missing papers than we see today, and whether he adapted his style for fear of further trouble with the law.
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Campbell is considered one of Ulster’s ‘Weaver Poets’, and like many of them he was a Freemason. However, ‘Willie Wark’s Song’ is notable for being the only Ulster-Scots poem in the book that appeared in 1820, after his death.
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Unusually for the Weaver Poets, Campbell seems to have had no religious views. The 1820 book contains a poem entitled ‘Inscription For the Tombstone of Thomas Paine, Author of the “Rights of Man”’. Paine was an atheist whose ideas were said to have inspired the Rebellion.
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A schoolmaster called McDowell took it upon himself to ‘judiciously suppress’ (to quote John Fullarton’s preface to the book) some of Campbell’s writing while editing the 1820 book – and again we can only guess at what was lost in this final insult to his work.
Willie Wark's Song
by James Campbell
The Discussion
The Poem
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​​​​Glossary
ye – you
o’ – of
frae - from
ye’ll – you will
tak it ill – take it badly
twa – two
ane – one
hae – have
cled – clad
wi – with
an – and
mony – many
doon – down
auld – old
cauld – cold
sairs – serves
baith – both
sark – shirt
burn’t – burn it
turn’t – turned
while’er – as long as
soople – smart young men
chiels – young men
wrang – wrong
gat - got
sae – so
no - not
mindin – remembering
sang – song
amang - among
wames – bellies
dirk - dagger
sic – such
ance – once
war’ – were
crappy loon – scared rascal
nane – none
gie – give
ithers - others
ta’en – taken
row’t – rolled
creeshy cloot – greasy cloth
shew – show
stane – stone
wad – would
dight his spees – wipe his spectacles
stan - stand
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Note:
seven thirteens - a 'thirteen' was an ENGLISH shilling (which was formerly worth thirteen pence of Irish currency).
half a crown was 2 shillings and 6 pence
Willie Wark's Song
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Ye loyal lads o’ Ballynure
Frae Mackaystown to black Bruslee,
I’m sure ye’ll hardly tak it ill
A verse or twa frae ane like me.
For seventy Simmers I hae seen
The heather cled wi’ bells o’ blue;
An mony an up an’ doon has been,
Since this auld coat o’ mine was new.
My coat though auld keeps out the cauld,
It sairs me baith for coat an’ sark:
But I would burn’t afore I turn’t
While’er my name is Willie Wark.
In Seventy we had hearts o’ steel,
In Eighty we had Valunteers;
An’ Ballynure had soople chiels,
As by the county books appears.
In Ninety-eight we arm’d again,
To right some things that we thought
wrang;
We gat sae little for our pains,
Its no worth mindin’ in a sang.
An’ now we’ve got a Yeoman core,
Selected frae amang a tribe;
The number reaches to a score -
Fifteen for peats an’ five for pride.
In scarlet they hae cled their wames,
An’ at their side a dirk is hung;
An’ sic a band o’ bold yeomen,
In poets sang was never sung.
You Jamie Park should silent been,
For ance ye war’ a crappy loon;
Ye bought a pike at seven thirteens,
When ither folks was half a crown.
But nane o’ it would you gie up
Although by you war’ ithers ta’en
Ye row’t it in a creeshy cloot,
An Skilton yet can shew the stane.
But here’s a health to auld Square Dobbs
For he is a right honest man;
An if he wad but dight his spess,
He’d then see matters as they stan.
James Campbell 1814
Literary Analysis
Ulster-Scots poets often called their poems sangs (a common device in 18th and 19th century poetry). Clearly some were intended to be sung, but not all.
In the first verse, tak it ill means ‘take it badly’. Many of the rural poets (or Bards) introduced their work in this self-effacing way. The metaphor of the coat is extended into verse two, in a common poetic form called ‘personification’ in the second line, where Campbell says the heather is cled (clothed) with bluebells.
In verse three, Campbell hints at his lack of money, as he states in the second line that his coat sairs me baith for coat an’ sark (‘serves me as both a coat and a shirt’). In the final two lines of the verse, Campbell is getting down to the point of the poem. In Ulster dialect generally, the expression turn one’s coat means ‘change one’s religion or political allegiance’. Campbell will not back down.
The Hearts of Steel or Steelboys was an exclusively Protestant movement that began in 1769 in County Antrim, as a protest against a hike in rents and a consequent increase in evictions. These protests spread into Armagh, Down and Londonderry before being suppressed by the army. The Volunteers were local militias raised initially to guard against invasion while British soldiers were moved from Ireland to fight abroad in the American Revolutionary War. While the army was preoccupied elsewhere, the Volunteers put pressure on the government at Westminster to give the Dublin parliament the right to make its own laws. Members of the Belfast 1st Volunteer Company formed the basis for the United Irishmen organisation, but the majority of the Volunteers tended towards the Yeomanry, which helped defeat the United Irishmen in the 1798 Rebellion.
Ballynure’s souple chiels were ‘smart young men’, while the county books in the 19th century were official, and legal, records of the County courts and councils.
The ironic following verse is a reminder of the disastrous outcome of the Rebellion. Campbell concludes ‘It’s not worth remembering in a song/poem’.
Wames are ‘bellies’. Crappy loon just means ‘croppy boy’, referring to the cropped hair of the United Irishmen. Jamie spent more on his pike than others! The last word in the verse is a good example of a feature often found in Ulster-Scots poetry, where the word is spelt the same as in English, but it is clear that the intended pronunciation is Ulster-Scots (in this case croon).
Jamie clearly informed on other rebels, but would not give up his weapon, instead rolling it in a greased cloth (row’t it in a creeshy cloot), and burying it under a stone. Campbell ends on a sarcastic note, with a toast to Squire Dobbs, and the suggestion that he should dight (wipe) his spess (presumably specs – ‘spectacles’).