Skip to content
  • About
  • About
Scottish Diaspora Blog
  • About
Written by tanja-sdb on November 30, 2015

Happy St Andrew’s Day 2015

Research Story

Screen Shot 2015-11-29 at 23.18.32St Andrew’s Ball’s have been celebrated around the world since the nineteenth century, with a few earlier examples pointing to the ball’s roots. I have written about these balls in detail – in fact, an image of a St Andrew’s Ball is on the cover of my last book. It was, therefore, a particular pleasure for me to finally attend a ball, namely that of the Hong Kong St Andrew’s Society. This ball was amongst the largest balls in the world, easily attracting well over 1,000 guests in the late nineteenth century. In 1886, the annual St Andrew’s Day ball was, as the China Mail noted, one of great sociability, with an illustrious round of guests gathered at the City Hall. This had been superbly decorated for the occasion. The exterior of the Hall, for instance, had been illuminated by ‘gas jets arranged in the form of the familiar Gaelic welcome’, lighting up the front of the building. On the staircase, ‘[p]rominent above everything stood the word “Caledonia”‘.  Inside, in the ante-room, a ‘gigantic St Andrew’s cross’ had been created, while the theatre was set up as a supper room for guests. At half-past nine, H.E. the Acting Governor the Hon W.H. Marsh arrived at the ball with his wife, and was welcomed by the Hon. Mr Ryrie, the St Andrew’s Society’s President. As was common at the time, greetings were wired to Scots celebrating St Andrew’s Day elsewhere, including ‘to the Scots in Singapore, where the day was also celebrated by a Ball, and a reply was received during the supper reciprocating the greetings and expressing the hope that the Hongkong Scots were enjoying their haggis.’

HKStASBallHEADER2

1886 St Andrew’s Ball in Hong Kong; cut from a larger print in The Graphic, 26 February 1887.*

In that spirit of dispensing greetings:
A happy St Andrew’s Day to all Scottish friends around the world!

 

To learn more about St Andrew’s Balls in Hong Kong, please visit St Andrew’s Balls in Hong Kong: A Short History.

 

For more on celebrating St Andrew around the world, check out these two posts from the Blog archive:
  • St Andrew’s Day and the Scots in British East Africa
  • The global saint: St Andrew’s Day in the Scottish Diaspora
  • Celebrating St Andrew’s Day in the Far East
* Thanks to Alan Macdonald for providing a copy of the image.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Archives

  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011

Calendar

February 2021
M T W T F S S
1234567
891011121314
15161718192021
22232425262728
« Jan    

Categories

  • Announcement
  • Comment
  • Event
  • Guest Post
  • News
  • Photo Gallery
  • Research Story
  • Uncategorized
  • WW1

Copyright Scottish Diaspora Blog 2021 | Theme by ThemeinProgress | Proudly powered by WordPress