Then she’ll be a fair maid from my home village
Tonight, for both blogs, I have people to thank for providing the image inspiration. In this case, its a lovely guy named Matt, that I used to work with, in my last long term job before this one, from which we both took redundancy at the same time. Fortunately for me, the last couple of days he’s been in Scarborough. So, given that info, and the blog title, well, if you havent worked out the song, I’m disappointed!
I think its fair to say, that unless I had miraculously became a major acting sensation, I was never in danger of being the most famous woman who lived her childhood in Haworth! Funnily enough, neither of us were actually born there. Her, because her famous Father only took up the pastor role there when she was a babe in arms, and me, because my family couldnt get my mother back to Yorkshire in time! Some of whom probably never forgave her for the fact I couldnt have played cricket for Yorkshire (as things stood at the time), but my father was based in Chatham, in the Navy, so…
Yes, I wonder if the treatment of an intersex baby might have been different in a West Yorkshire hospital, to a Kent one, but we will never know!
But yes, just under 140 years before I went home to Haworth for the first time (I was told within a few weeks of birth), a far more famous family to be arrived in the village for the first time, the Bronte’s! The youngest, seemingly the sweetest, and the one I took most interest in, was Anne. No, not the most famous of the 3 writers by far, but maybe thats why I was always closest to her, her lack of relative fame!
In the end, only 2 members of the ‘family’ who lived in that Parsonage arent buried in the little church at Haworth. One is cheating a bit, because he was never a Bronte. Charlotte’s husband, Arthur Bell Nicholls, who returned to Ireland after their father died in 1861, and wasnt offered the parish priesthood is one, the other of course, was Anne.
In her life, she fell in love with Scarborough, and decided that was where she was going, to end her life. As much as history tells us, Charlotte couldnt summon the means, or enthusiasm to take her dead body back to Haworth, or of course, its possible that Anne made it clear she wanted to be buried there. So, in St Mary’s Churchyard, just under the Castle, she was put to rest. I have visited her there, more times than you can imagine, though not in recent years, for various reasons, at least partly, health! Its quite a climb up there, believe me!
Anyway, I asked Matt very nicely to pay my respects for me, and not only that, but I found a picture in my Facebook timeline today, this one.
The new plaque is actually more recent than my last visit, but is a nice touch, as the old one, like me, is very much showing its age! Maybe, like a few other places, one more visit is called for at least? I really should, but… we will see!
So yes, I dont think, that now, whatever I do, I’ll ever be more than the 4th most famous woman to live in Haworth, lol, and I’m not even sure I’d rank that high!
So, video time. I only know one song title mentioning Scarborough, and if there is more, this is the most famous one!
stevielounicks 
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