Clarinda Burns Club (currently unclear if this is Glasgow Clarinda Club)

Overview

This club was named after ‘Clarinda’, the name adopted by Agnes McLehose (or MacLehose, M’Lehose, Meklehose), whose affair with Robert Burns (‘Sylvander’) is the subject of ‘Ae fond kiss’ (1791).

The Annual Burns Chronicle and Club Directory for the years 1908-1911 include this club’s syllabi. The group met once a month from October until March. In addition to the lectures, there were various social activities. To give a few examples, beyond the celebration of Burns night in January every year, there was a ‘Ladies’ Night – Tea, &c., Harmony’, a ‘Church Parade’, and a Ladies’ Night that included ‘Progressive Whist, Music, Dancing’.

Date of Existence

1899-1937?

Source of Information

1. (Mentioned in Minutes of Glasgow and District Burns Club: minute entry, 11 December 1907, Minutes, Glasgow and District Burns Club, 8 November 1907-5 September 1912, p. 9 (MLSC, 891709));

2. ‘McLehose (or MacLehose, M’Lehose, Meklehose), Agnes (‘Clarinda’)’, The Biographical Dictionary of Scottish Women, ed. by Elizabeth Ewan, Sue Innes, and Sian Reynolds (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2006), p. 237;

3. Vance, Michael E., ‘Burns in the Park: A Tale of Three Monuments’, in Robert Burns and Transatlantic Culture, ed. by Sharon Alker, Leith Davis and Holly Faith Nelson (Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate Publishing, 2012), pp. 209-232 (p. 225);

4. ‘Club Notes’, in BC, ed. by D. M’Naught, No. XX (Kilmarnock: Burns Federation, January 1911), p. 132;

5. ‘Directory of Burns Clubs and Scottish Societies on the Roll of the Burns Federation, 1914’, in BC, ed. by D. M’Naught, No. XXIII (Kilmarnock: Burns Federation, January 1914), p. 223

Repository

Mitchell Library Special Collections (MLSC) (minutes, and Annual Burns Chronicle)

National Library of Scotland (NLS) (Annual Burns Chronicle)

Reference Number

891709 (MLSC) (Minutes)

BNS19BUR (MLSC) (Annual Burns Chronicle)

General Reading Room (stored offsite), Y.233, available no. 1-34 25th Jan. 1892-Jan. 1925 (NLS) (Annual Burns Chronicle)

Additional Notes

See also Glasgow and District Burns Club.

BC‘ refers to the Annual Burns Chronicle and Club Directory, which was published yearly since 1892. Hard copies are available at the Mitchell Library Special Collections and the National Library of Scotland. Many of them have been digitised and are available through the Robert Burns World Federation website: http://www.rbwf.org.uk/digitised-chronicles/

This list of Burns chronicles as sources of information gives the first year the club was included in the chronicle, and thereafter only for the years where the information is different from the previous year’s listing. In keeping with the scope of this study (1800-1914), only the chronicles published between 1892 and 1914 are included.