A Family Business

Marion Ritchie, always listed as Mrs David Ritchie (a convention left over from the Edwardian era), founded the choir in 1927 and was subsequently awarded an MBE in 1952 for her services to music. She would hardly have believed that her choir would still be performing almost 60 years after it began.  All good things come to an end, not least the Newhaven Fisherwomen’s Choir.

Mrs Ritchie died in 1954 at the peak of the choir’s popularity and international reputation. Her daughter, Marion (Menie) Addison, assumed the role of conductor and for a further twenty or more years sustained the members’ diary at a laudable level despite the increasing average age of the choir. Her sister, Betty, was the choir’s accompanist from its establishment until her death the year before its 50th anniversary.  Even at the time of the choir’s Golden Jubilee in 1977, there were still 22 active members.

International Fame

At first, the choir was composed of only fisherwomen but in latter years was made up of fishermen’s wives and relatives. In their time, they travelled all over Scotland, from the Orkneys to the Borders, and further, to London and Norway. Even in 1975, the last year in the diary that had a list of singing engagements, they had eleven public performances including an appearance on STV’s Watchnight Service live from the Gateway Studio on Leith Walk. Sadly, this was to be the last performance for Betty Ritchie who died on February 15th 1976.

Much praise was showered on the choir in their special anniversary year. Full acknowledgement was given in the press at the time for their tireless fund-raising efforts over their five decades’ existence whereby tens of thousands of pounds had been raised for good causes.

Jubilee Presentation

Throughout the lifetime of the choir, the Newhaven Fisherwomen were instantly recognised as they always performed in their ‘braws’ traditional costumes of two coloured petticoats, each of which contained three yards of material, and their Paisley pattern shawls.

In the diary, a final act of charity is noted when, on August 17th, 1977 a bench was presented to the then City of Edinburgh’s Lord Provost, Ken Borthwick, by Mr Charles Addison, Menie’s husband, in celebration of the Fisherwomen’s Choir’s Golden Jubilee. This bench was sited at the corner of Craighall Road and the junction of Main Street and Pier Place. A cine film made at the time will shortly be available on our website,
www.newhavenheritagecentre.scot.

It is one of the benches that are now on Pier Place opposite Alien Rock, which used to be St Andrew’s Chuch where the choir performed on occasion.

This, sadly, is the last entry in the diary. The choir went on for a few more years but eventually a combination of the ageing process — conductor Menie was already 80 at the time of the Jubilee — and attrition brought the choir to a close around 1985.

SMT Thanks

In May 1947, the SMT bus company treated the ladies of the Choir to an all-expenses-paid bus trip to Loch Lomond coming home via Fintry and a ferry crossing at the Forth Bridge. This was as a thank you for the years of business the Newhaven Fisherwomen’s Choir had given the company transporting them to the various engagements.