Pollock Occupation

pwright · Post by **pwright** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 1:31 am

Any idea what a Cawfeeder is?

Thanks,

Post by **marilyn morning** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 1:44 am

Hi pw

Welcome to TalkingScot!

I'm not sure what a cawfeeder is? Here's a link to some old occupations, perhaps its listed?

http://talkingscot.com/forum/viewtopic. ... a141439e5b

Regards
Marilyn

Post by **SarahND** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 2:03 am

Hi Paul,
Remember that this came from an Ancestry.com transcription of the census, so may well be a typo.... Cow feeder? Anyone know? Seems a bit of a jump to go from stone mason to cow feeder, though. It would seem more reasonable if it had something to do with stones

Perhaps Southpaw has the original image and can tell us what it actually says

Regards,
Sarah

Post by **marilyn morning** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 2:05 am

Hi Sarah,

Maybe not? Wouldn't a farm need stone walls to keep in the cows?

Regards
Marilyn

Currie · Post by **Currie** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 4:09 am

Definitely a Caw of the mooing variety.

I have seen the Cowfeeder occupation on another 1851 census entry. That was in the depths of Edinburgh. From what I've heard the dairys containing the cows were in the centre of the city and their feed was brought in from the country. I suppose Cowfeeders were involved somewhere in that process.

Alan

Currie · Post by **Currie** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 6:03 am

It seems that Cowfeeding may not have been as unskilled an occupation as it sounds. Here’s a snippet from a short biography of Robert Burns.

There was one thing that Burns could not endure, and that was any sort of cruelty, or even carelessness, in the treatment of the lower animals. It put him in a perfect frenzy of passion. Once a servant girl so carelessly prepared the food for one of the cows, that the poor animal was nearly choked in swallowing it. This was the only time the servant saw him really angry. “His looks, gesture, and voice were terrible, so that the girl was glad to get out of his sight.” (Sangster’s “Picturesque Scotland” c. 1880)

Alan

Southpaw · Post by **Southpaw** » Wed Aug 22, 2007 6:56 pm

I checked the 1851 census image on SP and it looks like Cow Feeder to me. In the 1861 census his occupation is given as Stone Mason and in the 1871 census it is given as Farmer, 55 Acr, 20 Arable. As I mentioned in the other post, on his death certificate in 1876 he is described as a farmer.

Southpaw

Post by **AnneM** » Thu Aug 23, 2007 4:26 pm

Hi Currie

I love that quote about Burns. Makes him seem more real and shows that there is definitely an art in feeding cows.

Anne

Currie · Post by **Currie** » Fri Aug 24, 2007 10:46 am

Here’s a bit more Anne, following on from that quoted previously. This part would be more familiar. The book I referred to was written by Francis Watt, M.A., and the Rev. Andrew Carter, M.A.

Had it been a man who had offended him, Burns would probably have given the careless one still worse treatment. During his Ellisland life he was out one morning cutting grass by the side of the Nith, when he heard a shot, and “presently a little wounded hare came hopling by me. You will guess my indignation at the inhuman fellow who could shoot a hare at this season, when all of them have young ones.” He sought “the inhuman fellow” out, and threatened him with a ducking in the river. He, however, took a deeper and more poetic revenge. The poor hare did not perish “unhonoured and unsung,” for Burns commemorated this incident in a poem, one of the finest he has composed in the purely English dialect. The last verse has always seemed to us peculiarly charming:-

Oft as by winding Nith, I, musing, wait
The sober eve, or hail the cheerful dawn,
I’ll miss thee, sporting o’er the dewy lawn
And curse the ruffian’s aim, and mourn thy hapless fate.

Alan