I have put Clyde at the bottom of this line. Her daughter Meg was a popular name for bitches at that time, I have added her breeders name to hers so that for me she is known as Meg (Ashwin’s). Her main claim to fame is that when she was mated to Old Cockie she produced the outstanding dam called Maude who became the first sable and white bitch in the breed to have any lasting effect on the breed,
Because of this I have decided that Maude should have her own chapter. She is so important in the formation of the show Rough Collie. But before I write about Maude I must continue with Meg because she had a huge impact on the breed before her daughter. From my records Meg had four litters ranging from 1874 to 1881. She actually had a litter to Old Cockie the year before the birth of Maude.
A bitch from this first litter was called Bessie and she did breed on for another three or four generations. Meg then had her third litter to the famous Trefoil in about 1877. From this litter came a bitch called Glen and she whelped a bitch called Hasty in 1878. Now Hasty should have a history page to herself because the Collies coming down from her are legion.
She had a son called Rob Roy McGregor and two bitches called Flurry and Lilly. A reverse pedigree of these three fills my computer. Every Collie born today will almost certainly have all three in their pedigree. Mr Ashwin had a real treasure in his Meg. She must have been a wonderful dam.
Meg was also the granddam of a dog called Sefton that goes down in history as the sire of Ch Metchley Wonder the most prolific sire of his time. Sefton was by Ch Charlemagne out of Madge 11 that was one of the daughters of Ruby 111.
I have put in a reverse pedigree of Meg as it shows in some detail the influential bitches she bred. I will now go into some detail about these bitches as they are important for the history of the breed. These bitches were called Maude, Glen, Bessie, Colley and Elly.
The next daughter of Meg was a bitch called Glen when she was mated to Trefoil. Glen I always thought was a dog’s name but not in this case. She goes down in Collie history by being the dam of a bitch called Hasty the sire being a famous dog called Carlyle. Mr Wheeler liked Hasty as he describes her as a very attractive tricolour with a head above average quality. She goes down in history as being the dam of a famous sire called Rob Roy Macgregor and a bitch called more simply Lilley and enough said about her when I write that she was the granddam of Ch Metchley Wonder. I just cannot forget about this dog. He was everywhere.
REVERSE PEDIGREE of: Meg
Sex: F
Date of Birth: 01/01/1872
Colour & Markings:
Owner:
+--Meg
| +--Maude
| | +--CH Charlemagne 10691
| | +--Flirt (Bissell)
| | +--Lorna (Bissell) 5437
| | +--Patience
| | +--Losna
| | +--Watch
| | +--Trevor
| +--Glen (bitch)
| | +--Hasty
| +--Cheiften
| +--Bessie (Ashwin's)
| | +--Mossy
| +--Colley 111
| | +--Sable 11
| +--Eily
| | +--Jean
Maude was sired by Old Cockie and Glen her dam, by Trefoil. She was born in 1875.
Maude as a daughter of Old Cockie was a sable and white because all of Cockie’s offspring where this colour. He was what we call a dominant sable. The mystery is where did he get this colour from as all Collies in those days were either just black and white or tricolour? Now some of us are thinking that this dog was most probably a Welsh Collie because he was said to be quite small as are the Welsh Collies and he was brown in colour with a white collar. Many of the Welsh Collies that are still on some Welsh farms are brown and white, very different from the Border Collie which are almost all black and white.
Old Cockie was evidently a very good worker as well as an exceptional show dog. The most surprising fact about this very famous dog is that he was not actively used at stud until he was eight years old. Was it his colouring that put breeders off using him on their black and white bitches?
Maude was bred in 1875 by Mr J Bissell who was to have a big influence in the early days of the breed as he bought in Old Cockie and Meg the dam of Maude.
Maude goes down in the history of the breed as being the dam of Ch Charlemagne and the granddam of Ch Eclipse. Both of these dogs were to have a major influence on the breed in the 1880 to 1890 period when the breeders were setting a type for the breed.
A lot of line breeding and even the odd inbreeding was taking place. In fact, Ch Eclipse was the result of a brother sister mating as his sire was Ch Charlemagne and his dam a bitch simply called Flirt was the litter sister of Ch Charlemagne.
Maude did not produce many bitches to carry on her female line, but she will go down in the history of the breed as probably the most important dam of all time as every Rough Collie ever bred goes back to her. She was certainly the most important of all of Old Cockie’s offspring.
Maude’s sable colouring was somewhat different to the sables we see today. The colour was much richer and darker. The nearest we have are what we call mahogany sable that are, unfortunately, rather rare today. The sables in those days often lacked the white collar but had white legs and of course the white tip at the end of the tail. It was Maude who combined the two main lines of that time and it was she who had the most influence on the acceptance of the Sable and White colour being the most popular choice for the pet buying public. This colour really did have an enormous impact and was almost single handed in bringing the Rough Collie to the state where in 1900 it was the most popular breed in the World.
This popularity was obviously very much helped by the fact that Queen Victoria owned and bred them. She was started off by the Rev Hans Hamilton giving her at least one Rough Collie. One of them was the full brother of Ch Christopher from an earlier litter. She actually showed this dog at the very first all breed Crufts show in 1891.
Here I can state that the first Crufts dog shows were for Terriers. The show in 1891 was in fact the seventh Crufts dog show. The Queen’s daughter in law showed Rough Collies at Crufts under the Sandringham prefix.
Enormous publicity does have its drawbacks though and overbreeding produced serious temperament and construction problems in the breed so that by 1910 it was down amongst the also rans. It would appear that every time a breed becomes very popular, breeders then try to outperform what has appeared before and exaggerations in the construction of the breed come to the fore with the obvious outcome that the breed will lose its popularity rather quickly.
Back in those days the breeders and judges desired that the head should be long, and I mean long. I read an article written in 1894 where the writer extoled the virtues of the length of head of one particular dog, Sowerby Squire who was by the then popular sire Finsbury Pilot out of a bitch called Sowerby Model. This dog evidently had a head that measured 17 inches in length. I must admit I struggled to get my head round that figure. He was evidently a big winner being said to have been beaten only once in the show ring. The longest head we ever had on one of our Collies was Corydon King Hector whose head measured 13 inches. He was a very big dog, but I have to admit that his head was not balanced with his foreface being somewhat longer than his skull. I have to assume that this dog with his extraordinarily long head must have looked very ugly especially as he was very much overshot in his jaw. Causing the putting off the pet buying public in large numbers.
The breed became extremely popular in the 1970’s and once again we got exaggerations come into the breed that had a detrimental effect on this popularity. This time the exaggeration was for the very heavy coats that were too soft and were completely unmanageable for the pet market, therefor the breed went into a fairly dramatic decline in popularity. For example. in 1976 the Kennel Club registrations for Rough Collies was over 7000 but by 2023 this number had dropped to just over 400.
Maude had three litters. The first was to Tartan who was a full brother to Trefoil. Mr Wheeler did not like him as he thought that his head was poor, his tan was too dark and his coat was too open. But this mating did produce two bitch puppies who were to have an important impact on the breed. These were a sable and white called Lorna which I have had to call Bissel’s Lorna as there were many other Lorna’s at that time. This bitch was the dam of Ch Wolf one of the very first Champions and he was the sire of Ch Rutland a very popular stud dog who was bred by Rev Hans Hamilton.
The other bitch from this litter was a tricolour called Watch which seems to be a unique name as I cannot find any other Collie with this name. All these names were registered at The Kennel Club before any breeders had prefixes. Watch became an ancestor of several blue merle lines. And it is this line that goes right up to 1959.
Maude’s second litter was also to Tartan. This litter produced the very famous Ch Charlemagne and a bitch called Flirt a sable and white who goes down in history as the dam of Ch Eclipse when she was mated to her litter brother Ch Charlemagne.
Patience a tricolour was the get from Maude’s third litter. Patience claim to fame is that she was the dam of the hugely successful sire Young Cockie. His sire being a dog called Champagne.
Ch Charlemagne was one of the first really big show winners. He was now competing in the new name of the breed the Rough Collie. Before this time which was about 1874 the Collies competed under the Sheepdog name. Maude’s importance becomes even more evident because Tricolour 11 her paternal grandson was a very effective sire in his time. He was the son of Tricolour the full brother later litter of Trefoil.
Wheeler liked this dog saying that he was very similar in type to his more illustrious brother, He does comment on the length of frill that these two dogs had. He said that this was typical of some of the Scottish dogs but that they had the fault of domed skulls. We do not know if their ancestors came from Scotland of if they were bred for several generations in Ireland.
It was doing this research that proved to me the theory that Rough Collies had a very low gene pool was not as I was led to believe, because even though Trefoil is at the head of the male line there were many other dogs that contributed through their daughters.
And the bitches they mated to produce good producing bitches were also very numerous outcrosses. Trefoil is at the base of the male line, but his influence on the breed was not as great as Old Cockie because it was this dog that introduced the Sable and white colour to the breed.
Maude’s son Ch Charlemagne was the top winner of his day and was unbeaten for about five years. At the age of eleven he was entered in the Rough Collie Clubs show where he won the 60guinea trophy. This is the trophy that is now awarded to the Best in Show at the British Collie Clubs Championship Show. He must be the oldest exhibit ever to win this most prestigious award. He was a very good sire with many winners owning him as their sire. He is also in direct male line for all Rough Collies. His main claim to fame though is through his son Ch Eclipse and his grandson Ch Metchley Wonder.
This is a reverse pedigree of Maude showing how important she was for the future of the breed. These 7 generations are the most important males coming directly from her.
Maude
| Charlemagne
| | Sefton
| | | CH Metchley Wonder
| | | | CH Christopher
| | | | | Stracathro Ralph
| | | | | | Heather Ralph
| | | | | | | CH Ormskirk Emerald
A study of this reverse pedigree proves what importance she had on the future of the breed.
Danvis Gay Girl is at the head of the only line I can find going back to Maude. She was born in 1959 so this line went on for some 80 years. I am sure that there are other lines but they are not recorded.
Dam Line of: Danvis Gay Girl. This shows her dam on the left and sire on the right.
Danvis Dolly …………………………………CH Legend of Ladypark
Danvis Doreen ………………………………CH Danvis Driver
CH Danvis Dyllorna ………………………..Danvis Dawson
CH Danvis Deborah ………………………..CH Lochinvar of Ladypark
Danvis Delta ………………………………….CH Gunner of Mariemeau
Danvis Favourite …………………………….Longscar Leader
Redevalley Rita ………………………………Eden Electrician
Redevalley Freda ……………………………
Old Mill Duchess ……………………………
Freda of Waldemar ………………………….Bruce of Waldemar (Beau Perfection)
Noble Sasha ………………………………..
Brenda of Proud Heights ……………………..
Sheila of Proudheights ………………………Rex
Laund Letto …………………………..
Laund Lesketh ………………………………..Laund Leadem
CH Laund Laud (Eden Elsie) (Almondbank Bess)….Laund Leo
Hallwood Secure …………………………….Almondbank Bummer
Hallwood Serene ……………………………..CH Magnet
Kettering Ideal ………………………………..CH Seedley Stirling
Seedley Lady ………………………………….CH Seedley Superior
CH Seedley Sapphire …………………………
Sweet Mary ……………………………………CH Parbold Peacock
Rose of Rosendale …………………………..Parbold Perriot
Ladysmith …………………………………….Rosendale Clinker
Silver Sylvia …………………………………..Hassia Prinz
Thur Mary …………………………………….Thur Figaro
Thur Countess ……………………………….Thur Bishop
Godiva Madge ………………………………..Donavan II
Lady Godiva …………………………………..Smuggler
Aggie ……………………………………………CH Eclipse
Watch …………………………………………..Garry
Maude ………………………………………….Tartan
Meg ……………………………………………..Old Cockie
Clyde ……………………………………………Mec
Sweet Mary was the dam Ch Seedley Sapphire and also one of the most popular sires called Master Willie and he in turn was the sire of Ch Parbold Picador who was the sire of many Laund greats including Champions Laund Limit and Laund Luminous.
Sweet Mary’s Champion daughter Seedley Sapphire was even more important as she was the main foundation bitch for the Seedley kennel. This was one of the truly great kennels in the early 1900’s making up a whole host of Champions. It is amazing that a bitch like Sweet Mary can have such an influence on the breed.
I did a reverse pedigree of Ladysmith. It went on and on. She was behind most of the main stud dogs of the period before the first World War. In fact she is behind every Rough Collie in the World today.
Another bitch in this line is Patricia of Mariemeau, she was the dam of one of the most influential sires in the breed Ch Gunner of Mariemeau and he was the sire of an even more influential dog Ch Gunner of Glenturret.
This family illustrates how difficult it is to try and find these lines. Two of the bitches had their names changed twice. The first was Ch Laund Laud that started off in life as Almondbank Bess then she became Eden Elsie before becoming Ch Laund Laud when she won her title. The other bitch was Eden Entina that started her registered life as Miss Diplomat before being bought by Mr Stansfield who changed her name to Laund Diplomat then on to Mr Robson who changed her name yet again to have his kennel prefix and her other name changed completely.
The main problem here is that whenever the Laund or Eden kennels bought in a Collie they changed the name so that it looked as if they had bred them. I know that the Laund kennel made up about 50 Champions, but most were not bred by him nor indeed did they have any Laund bred parents. These two kennels were dealers in the breed.
Going back to the start of this line we find a bitch by the name of Hallwood Serene that had another daughter called Hallwood Secure, and this bitch goes on to be behind the very famous Danvis line.
The most important dam was Ch Danvis Deborah as she was the granddam of Ch Danvis Damaskus one of only two dogs to win a Best in Show award at an all breed Championship Show. Ch Danvis Damaskus was also the grandsire of Ch Witchcraft of Rokeby through his daughter Retta of Rokeby. Yet the dam lines of these famous bitches ended after just five generations. An eight generation reverse pedigree of Ch Danvis Deborah went on for ever. I have to assume that every Rough Collie born today will have her in their pedigree.
Danvis were very dominant during the 1940/50 period. I cannot find any offspring of these two bitches. Tom Purvis was held in great affection in the North East of England and I remember the Darlington Championship show had a black band round the prize cards after his death.
Corydon Collies 