Can anyone else remember going Christmas carolling?

[davebrmm]

late 40s early 50s used to stand outside hillfoot club with our tins had to go to evry house in our street after 12 to let in new year I had dark hair whiich was considered to be lucky happy days before all this ooming right crap

[ozirose]

That brought back memories! cold feet and hands but what a joy it was. I too have been in Australia many years now and couldn't imagine carolling here - far too hot at christmas time!

[Thorpy]

Me and a couple of mates used to go out carolling a few days before Christmas during the late forties- early fifties. We'd probably be doing it from being about ten years old to about the age of thirteen-fourteen. I remember setting off about 7 pm on bitterly cold nights, we'd cover all our area over those few days(Highfields, Bramall Lane, Edmund Road etc.). We used to really enjoy it, full of anticipation of Christmas day and also making a bit of spending money! We always made sure that we got back to Charlies (the Harwood House pub) on Hill Street for closing time-ten o' clock in those far off days. We'd make more money in those ten minutes as Dads and neighbours, who'd a few pints, came rolling out.

There was never a fear of us coming to any harm, although we were out for two or three hours in cold , gas lit streets. I look back on those Christmasses with great pleasure. Very happy days indeed!

[denlin]

Yes a gang of used to go and one old couple gave us £5 which was a lot of money in those days - in fact it was than I got a week when I started work in 1966 - and they invited us all in and gave us sweets and mince pies. It couldn't happen today could it? What a sad time we live in in some respects. My childhood was a happy time. I remember my parents used to tell me that I would have to be asleep by midnight as if I heard santas sleigh bells I wouldn't get any presents. I was gutted when I realised the bell was the pikelet man:D:D:hihi::hihi:

[hillsbro]

...Nobody turned us away, and nobody failed to hand over money. Were we that threatening?

I don't think that my brother and me looked threatening; it was what we sounded like... Anyone who heard our rendering of Good King Wenceslas would pay us to go away..

[nosy nellie]

Can anyone remember going round christmas caroling?a few of us used to get our tins with a slit in the top to put our sixpences in.we would sing our carols then knock on the door,sometimes they would invite us in for a mince pie and a drink and give us our sixpence on the way out.It was an honest way to get a bit of pocket money.we used to nearly freeze to death but i still hold those memories dear.Some of us used to paint our faces black so we could poke their fire for good luck.

 

Glen I think you are confusing caroling with Happy New Yearing.We used to go caroling singing carols at peoples doors before christmas and we had to sing the carol all the way through,and we wish you a Merry Christmas.

Then New Years Eve we would go mummering with our faces blacked and carried a lump of coal,and the darkest one amongst us would always be asked to poke the fire and we would sing Happy New Year,Happy New Year,Plenty of money and a cellar full of beer and we would always be given something to eat and perhaps a very small drop of Sherry.

We would wander all over the neighbourhood doing this we could in those days.Sometimes they would shout at us come back later your too early and when the pubs chucked out the men used to throw handsfull of copper at us.

When we had done we would go home frozen to the bone no long trousers thermals and padded jackets for us.However did we survive?

[hillsbro]

Why don't we all get together on New Year's Eve with our faces blacked (nellie - was that you I saw with a lump of coal down t' Rudyard in 1959?) Then as nosy nellie wrote, it might be:

 

Happy New Year, Happy New Year

Plenty of money and a cellar full of beer

Horse and a gig and a good fat pig

To last you all next year.

 

..or, more tunefully...

 

♫ O here we come a wassailing ♪ among the leaves so green ♪

O here we come a wassailing, so fair to be seen ♫

♪ ♫ Love and joy come to you,♫.and to you your wassail too ♪

May God bless you ♪ and send you a Happy New Year ♪ ♫

May God send you a Happy New Year ♫

[nefertari]

I mentioned Carol singing tonight whilst out trick or treating with my kids, seems odd that we never went trick or treating but always went Carol singing and took the guy around to the neighbours to show them and they would give us a bit of money which we used to buy fireworks.

If we'd gone round on Halloween they'd have looked at us gone out We always went out on mischevious night as well, knockedon a few doors and ran off that's all, but we felt mischevious.

Seem's like everything, and everyones attitudes have changed over the years as to what's acceptable and what's not hey ?

[nosy nellie]

Why don't we all get together on New Year's Eve with our faces blacked (nellie - was that you I saw with a lump of coal down t' Rudyard in 1959?) Then as nosy nellie wrote, it might be:

 

Happy New Year, Happy New Year

Plenty of money and a cellar full of beer

Horse and a gig and a good fat pig

To last you all next year.

 

..or, more tunefully...

 

♫ O here we come a wassailing ♪ among the leaves so green ♪

O here we come a wassailing, so fair to be seen ♫

♪ ♫ Love and joy come to you,♫.and to you your wassail too ♪

May God bless you ♪ and send you a Happy New Year ♪ ♫

May God send you a Happy New Year ♫

 

Right Hillsbro I will be ready.

Hole in me stocking Hole in me shoe.

Please can you spare me a copper or two,

If you aint got a copper silver will do,

If you aint got silver God bless you.

[Steptoad]

I remember circa 1980 going out with a group of local punks and singing the most raucous out of tune Christmas carols we could manage. If my memory serves me well the old folks liked it more than the middle-class younger people in the area.