Annotation:Lady Charlotte Murray (1)
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LADY CHARLOTTE MURRAY [1]. AKA and see "Cat in the Corner (1)," "Felix the Wrestler," "O'Mahoney's Frolics," "O'Shaughnessy's," "Puss in the Corner." Scottish, Jig. D Mixolydian. Standard tuning (fiddle). AAB. A double-tonic tune composed by Dunkeld, Perthshire, fiddler-composer Niel Gow (1727-1807). The tune honors both a mother and daughter named Lady Charlotte Murray. The elder Lady Charlotte [1] (1731-1805) was the daughter of the 2nd Duke of Atholl. In 1753, she married her first cousin, John Murray at Dunkeld, Scotland (also home to Niel Gow). John Murray should have ascended to the Dukedom upon the death of the 2nd Duke, however, as his father had fought on the Jacobite side he was prevented from inheriting. Lady Charlotte, however, had ascended to the title of Baron Strange (which could descend through the female line), and thus outranked her husband--for a short while, for in 1764 the House of Lords returned the Dukedom to John and he became the third Duke of Atholl, at which time Lady Charlotte became Duchess.
Her daughter, Lady Charlotte Murray (1754–1808), was a horticulturist who, in the year of her death, published a book entitled The British Garden, a Descriptive Catalogue of Hardy Plants, Indigenous or Cultivated in the Climate of Great Britain, with Their Generic and Specific Characters, Latin and Wnglish Names, Native Country, and Time of Flowering. (London, Thomas Wilson, 1808).
Poet Robert Burns stayed with the Murrays at Blair Atholl in 1787, later noting they were among the happiest days of his life. He found the Duke and Duchess gracious and hospitable, and was charmed by their family. The Murrays were so pleased to have Burns company that they sent a servant to bribe the driver of the chaise to pull off one of the horse's shoes in an effort to delay his departure, although the driver refused.
Source for notated version:
Printed sources: Carlin (The Gow Collection), 1986; No. 341. Gow (First Collection of Strathspey Reels), 1784 (revised 1801); p. 6 (appears as "Lady Charlotte Murray's (now Drummond) Jig").
Recorded sources: Banff Rodeo RBS 1066, Dan Joe MacInnis - "The Cape Breton Fiddle of Dan Joe MacInnis" (c. 1961).
See also listing at:
Alan Snyder's Cape Breton Fiddle Recording Index [2]
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