Nostalgia in pictures: 2013’s Lauder Common Riding

Lauder Common Riding, like all other festivals across the Borders, was called off this year due to the current coronavirus outbreak, so last weekend passed by with none of the spectacle townsfolk have come to expect since the event’s revival in 1911.

By Darin Hutson

Published 7th Aug 2020, 11:39 BST

Its next main day will now take place on Saturday, August 7, 2021, though some activities marking this year’s non-event have been taking place online.

To help compensate for the absence of this year’s common riding, here we take a look back at its 2013 predecessor, as caught on camera by Rob Gray.

Cornet seven years ago was landscape gardener Cameron McNeill, then 23.

Accompanied on his official duties by right and left-hand men Gregor Ker and Iain Dick, Cameron, as the town’s 90th cornet, was following in the footsteps of his father, Crawford McNeill, cornet 29 years previously.

His lass, Helen Middlemiss, wasn’t able to ride alongside him after sustaining a broken pelvis due to a riding mishap at that June’s Galashiels Braw Lads’ Gathering but did follow on foot.

“What happened to Helen at Galashiels was a bit of a disaster, but she has shown great courage to come back and take part in all the common riding events,” Cameron told the Southern’s Kenny Paterson, adding: “Lauder’s is a really popular festival now, and we get huge backing from other towns in the Borders.”