From: Robert Peter Burns <rburns-AT-scf.usc.edu>
Subject: Re: Pipin' Hot Haggis!
Date: Wed, 29 Nov 1995 10:40:17 -0800 (PST)


The Canadian jazzman wrote: 
> 
> On Tue, 28 Nov 1995, Robert Peter Burns wrote:
> 
> > My own forebear, the Scottish poet Robert Burns
> > had this to say:
> 
> 	Och -- Ye're no _actually_ related to Robbie Burns, are ye? 
> 
> 	Hell -- if there's one thing we commies like to do, it's throw a 
> Robbie Burns Bash and chow down on haggis..!  :>

My great aunt Kathleen Burns who died a couple of years ago kept in
her possession an original invitation to the funeral of Jean Armour
which had been passed down in the family.  Jean Armour was the woman
RAbbie Burns married, though he is known to have had quite a few
affairs with the lassies.  And my grandfather Burns came from the
same part of the country as did RAbbie.  There were no Catholics
in that part of Scotland in Burns's time, so we reckon we ended
up Catholic because one of the Burns family married an Irish
Catholic immigrant woman sometime in the last century.  Another aunt
tried checking out the records some years ago, but many of the relevant
records were destroyed in a church fire over 100 years ago.  So I
can't confirm this for sure.  My other forebears are a mixture of
Irish, Italian and Highland Scottish.

An interesting fact is that in 1790 there were 39 Catholics resident
in Glasgow, and 43 anti-Catholic societies operating in the city.  By
1890 there were 250,000 Catholics in Glasgow <due to Irish immigration,
no doubt assisted by the fastbreeding nature of us papists.>  Thankfully
there was no proportionate increase in the number of proddy vigilante
groups.

I've attended a number of Burns Suppers <25 January>, and it's always 
great fun when I'm introducing myself to a stranger at them.  That's 
the one time when I insist on using my first name, "Robert".  <For
some reason I was always called by my second name, "Peter" in my
family, and generally that's what I prefer.>

Can ye play the bagpipes, jazzman?

Robert <Peter> Burns SJ
rburns-AT-scf.usc.edu   


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