I do this version by Carrie Grover

IT WAS ON A WINTER'S MORNING
As sung by Carrie Grover, recorded by Eloise Hubbard Linscott in Gorham Maine Oct 29 1943
Sarah Makem of Northern Ireland (Tommy Makem's mother) sang a version of this called "The Month of January"
My partner, Fred Gosbee's great, great grandmother had this experience in New Brunswick in the late 1800's. Being "in the family way" out of wedlock, she was locked out of the house in the winter. Her uncle finally took her in, but she lost her toes to frostbite.

It was on a winter's morning, the frost came down like snow
Over hills and lofty mountains where the wintry winds do blow
It was there I spied a female form all in a drift of snow
With her infant baby in her arms, she knew not where to go

Oh Hush my darling baby, I'll fold you to my breast
It's little does your father know this night we're in distress
It's little does your father know what we do undergo
Or he'd fold us in his arms all from the frost and snow

Oh cruel was my father, he shut the door on me
And cruel was mother for she might have pitied me
And cruel were the cold winds revenge that pierced my heart with cold
And so cruel was that young man who sold his heart for gold
-------

I've also seen a poem by Seba Smith (Maine writer from 1840's) which seems to inform the following version collected in England in 1907

The Fatal Snowstorm
From The Constant Lovers, Purslow
Collected from George Baldwin, Tichborne, Hants 1907

It was on one winter's evening when first came down the snow;
How keen was the air, when the winter wind did blow,
I saw a fair maid all alone sat weeping by the way
She warm'd her little baby, and sadly she did say:

"Oh! hush, my little baby, I'll warm thee at my breast,
How little does your father think how hard I am distressed;
The riches that I once enjoyed not knowing where they are,
I'll warm my baby at my breast from the cold and piercing air.

How cruel was my father to shut the door on me,
How cruel was my mother, a shocking sight to see;
How cruel was the winter wind that pierced my heart with cold,
How cruel was the young man that left his love for gold.

Oh! hush, my little baby, thy little life has gone."
How the tears from her eyes, how they run trickling down,
So fast as they flow they froze before they fall.
"Oh! wretched, wretched Mother, you grieves me more than all."

And then she sank her baby all in the depth of snow,
And like a little lamb again lamenting she did go,
She kissed her baby's cold wet lips and laid it by her side
She cast her eyes to Heaven, and bowed her head and died.



here;s Smith's lyric

The Snow Storm, A Ballad
Poetry by Seba Smith, Music by L. Heath
(Boston: Oliver Ditson, 1843)
http://www.iath.virginia.edu/utc/sentimnt/snowstormf.html

The cold wind swept the mountain's height,
And pathless was the dreary wild,
And mid the cheerless hours of night
A mother wandered with her child.

As through the drifted snows she pressed,
The babe was sleeping on her breast,
The babe was sleeping on her breast.

And colder still the winds did blow,
And darker hours of night came on,
And deeper grew the drifts of snow--
Her limbs were chilled, her strength was gone.

"O God!" she cried, in accents wild,
"If I must perish, save my child,
"If I must perish save my child."

She stript her mantle from her breast,
And bared her bosom to the storm;
As round the child she wrapped the vest,
She smiled to think that it was warm.

With one cold kiss, one tear she shed,
And sunk upon a snowy bed,
And sunk upon a snowy bed.

At dawn, a traveller passed by,
And saw her 'neath a snowy veil--
The frost of death was in her eye,
Her cheek was cold, and hard and pale--

He moved the robe from off the child;
The babe looked up, and sweetly smiled,
The babe looked up, and sweetly smiled.