Valentine’s Day, with its excess of cards, plastic and fluffy hearts, may be a modern, commercialised institution, but its origins go far back, and sometimes can be found in unexpected circumstances. Although some celebrations and traditions can be traced to Roman times, it was during the nineteenth century that the modern-day customs began to take shape. Cards began to be produced commercially, and the exchange of tokens, gifts and flowers became widespread.

My own work, as a Professor of Music, considers life in nineteenth-century mental health institutions, most recently centring on the Crichton Royal Institution in Dumfries, Scotland. My particular focus is on the use of music, with both social and therapeutic functions. Here, I’ve found programmes for annual Valentine’s concerts starting in the late-1840s which both demonstrate some of the repertoire in popular use at the time and illustrate some of the customs around the day itself. Under the Crichton’s superintendent W.A.F. Browne, the institution aimed to act as a microcosm of normal social experience, and so we might imagine some of these customs mimic common practice in 1840s Scotland.

The first mention of St Valentine’s Day celebrations comes in the Crichton’s in-house patient magazine, The New Moon. In March 1848 it recorded the following:

St. Valentine’s Eve was celebrated by us somewhat in imitation of a practice in vogue during the Roman Lupercalia, when the names of the young women were put into a box, and drawn out by the young men; with this difference, that, although we had the box, the prizes were dissimilar, and the ladies, equally with the gentlemen, anxious for a draw. The mirth occasioned at the long face of a swain, who, supposing that, like Pandora’s box, the best prize lay at the bottom, nevertheless discovered he had drawn a bland; the laughter at another, who beheld himself travestied in a caricature; and the joy of some fair lady at the beauty of the valentine which had fallen to her lot, made up a scene, between the parts of a concert which was given in honour of the Saint, which must have delighted every beholder. The corps musicale had very serious misgivings, as to whether the fun would ever cease, and very nearly came to the conclusion that the further display of their powers must be postponed. But they were wrong; and, at the finish, the following extemporaneous compliment by one of the auditory was handed up to them:-

“Some sing for money, and some for glory,
But you sing here all con amore.”

And so the fun was over. But the amusement was so delightful, and the cogitations consequent thereon so pleasant, that, upon retiring, we were led to exclaim –

“Pause and reflect
That a day like this may never dawn again.”

The magazine records that a Drawing-room concert was given to mark the occasion, but no programme survives.

The earliest preserved programme of a Valentine’s Day concert is from the following year, 1849. The New Moon recorded on 3 March that 14 February saw ‘Concerts and Festivities [as] usual on St. Valentine’s Night’. The concert programme centres on Scottish and popular song, bookended by piano duets and small ensemble pieces. The repertoire is similar to other concerts performed at the Crichton, with little to reflect the special occasion.

Concert programme, 14 February 1849.

(Recreation and Printing Scrapbook. Source: Wellcome Collection; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)

Most of the performers here are staff of the institution; Mrs Browne, wife of the Superintendent, regularly contributed piano duets with Mrs Shaw, a local piano teacher and organist. Nevertheless, we might imagine patients joining in well-known songs and choruses.

The concert tradition continued into the 1850s, with the gradual introduction of repertoire more closely reflecting the theme of the day, such as the song ‘O my Love’s Bonny’, the Trio ‘Twas on the Morn of Valentine’, the glees ‘Here’s a health to all good Lasses’ and ‘To all ye Ladies’, the song ‘The Old Maid’s Love Letter’, and the humorous song ‘Scotch Wooing’. The concerts also included the practice of exchanging or delivering valentine’s cards and gifts. In 1855, for example, the programme notes that immediately before the interval, the ‘Post Delivers Valentines’.

Concert programme, 14 February 1855. 

(Recreation and Printing Scrapbook. Source: Wellcome Collection; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)

At the Crichton the emphasis was clearly on fun, entertainment and community rather than the celebration of couples we see today. Nevertheless, they ensured all patients had an opportunity to take part in traditional revelries, reinventing practices and developing new ones to provide, as far as possible, a positive experience for patients and staff alike.

See more of our Valentine's content in our OpenLearn Valentine's collection.