Tag Archives: legends and Folk Tales of Alderney

April 8, 2011 · 5:18 pm

Down to the Fairy Glen

This is the last in my folk tales and legends theme blog and it’s quite personal to me because I have vivid memories of walking deep into a woodland glade on Alderney as a child and striding (I was small at the time!) across the stepping stones, crossing a small flowing brook which meandered through the trees down towards the sea. This was my memory of The Fairy Glen on Alderney.

Imagine my surprise last year when a member of the Renier family, who now lives back on Alderney and I happened to get to know through my writing, mentioned the Fairy Glen. I was staying with a party of friends and family at The Harbour Lights last June and it was such a pleasure when the lady (I won’t mention her name without permission) took us on a walk to show us the glen. It was one of the highlights of the trip. Delighful!

My book Riduna includes snapshots of childhood memories too!

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April 7, 2011 · 11:40 am

More legends of Alderney

Another poignant legend refers to a large rock of granite above Telegraph Bay fashioned like a seat and the locals call it Lover’s Chair.

The story goes that a young couple were deeply in love. When their elders refused their betrothal they flung themselves into the sea to their deaths to be together for eternity.  This story and my novel certainly highlights the conflict between the strict moral code of the islanders back in the nineteenth century and the wishes of the youth, influenced greatly by the many visitors among them.

On a more light hearted note I was also charmed by the ghost of The White Bull which is said to charge along Le Val- yes many of the island names are still in French /Norman dialect which has died out since the island was evacuated. The official language on the island was French right up until World War 2. Before then school children sang both the English and French National Anthems at school each day.

Back to the legend of the bull, close to the beginning of the Riduna Jack and Joseph (the father’s of Harriet and Edward my main hero and heroine) were returning from a drink or two at The Diver’s Arms, which incidentally remains much the same as it was then near the harbour. They were more than slightly inebriated when they encountered The White Bull. Fortunately, or unfortunately a more pressing emergency caught their attention and the apparition was soon forgotten.

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April 4, 2011 · 10:06 am

Legends and Folk Tales – The Lighthouse Keeper’s Daughter

Many folktales gave me inspiration as I was researching for Riduna.

The most famous is the story of the daughter of the lighthouse keeper who lived with her family at Les Casquets Lighthouse  just west of the coast of Alderney.

According to legend and the poem of the same name by A C Swinburne;  A sailor who happened to be shipwrecked on Les Casquets fell in love with the daughter of the only family living on this little island rock.  (I have recently been called that she was called Rosebud) He persuaded her to marry him and to live on Alderney, but apparently she found it just too busy living in the little town of St Anne and fled back to the lighthouse, where she remained, living with her parents.

The population of Alderney today is not much more than 2,000 rose but it rose to its peak of 5,000 in the mid nineteenth century when the fortresses and Breakwater were being built, with many migrants from England, Ireland and even from as far as Italy. Les Casquets is now of course unmanned.

The island is at present encouraging new people, not only to visit for a holiday, but to take residence. I know i’m a great believer in real shops including book shops, but if you have an online business it would be a great place to base an off shore enterprise, with all the benefits living of on an island away from the rat race. Bliss!

Other people can explain better than I, so if you’re interested here’s a link:

This is Money

By the way, if you don’t know Alderney, Les Casquets is not the Mannez Island lighthouse you see in the article, from which the views are truly wonderful, but they stand on mainland Alderney.

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