PUTNEY BOWLING GREEN. English, Country Dance Tune and Jig (6/8 time). A Mixolydian. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. Putney Bowling Green was, from about 1690 to the close of the 18th century, a fashionable place of resort where people played at bowls. Horace Walpole, in 1750, related that the gentleman highwayman, James McLean, quarreled with and challenged an officer for disputing his rank at Putney Bowling Green; the captain declined till McLean should produce a certificate of his nobility. Walpole had reason to remark upon it, for McLean had robbed him previously. McLean's career was abruptly halted when he was hanged two months later at Tyburn, and the incident contributed to a decline in the popularity of the resort, and, in any case, the popularity of various public bowling greens was beginning to wane. Bowling Green House was converted into a private residence, and sold to Prime Minister William Pitt in the beginning of the 19th century. He died there in 1806. Bowling Green House, c. 1810
Additional notes
Printed sources : - Johnson (A Choice Collection of 200 Favourite Country Dances, vol. 4), 1748; No. 187, p. 94.
