Looking over the DT threads connected to "Whiskey You're the Divil," I didn't find any information about its origin. Sounds like it must have an interesting history. But the first I know of it is its performance by the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem in the 1950s.

1.   Can anyone trace it back BEFORE Makem and the Clancys? Was it one of the Makem family's songs? Derived from Sarah Makem? Someone else? Could someone who has the Clancy Bros Songbook check the notes to see if they say anything about its history?

2.   I'm curious in particular because it sounds like a medley of two or three songs. There is the "Whiskey you're the divil" part, which is usually given as a refrain. It sounds as if it goes with the second verse, "Says the mother, do not wrong me."

3.   Then comes the first verse with its "marchin' off to Portugal and Spain" part, which sounds like a piece of a different song -- perhaps a soldier's song? -- and yet another refrain, "Love, fare thee well." This seems to go best with the third verse, which has a French war theme.

4.   Then there's "Tithery aye the oodle um a da" or equivalent, with "whiskey in the jar," a phrase we know from at least one other song, "Kilgarry (or far famed Kerry, etc.) Mountain." Yet another refrain! From yet another song?

5   I have long had a hunch that "Whiskey in the jar," which sounds tacked onto both songs, might be the remnant of a separate (lost?) drinking song called "Whiskey in the Jar." Does anyone have an opinion on this, or know of such a song?

6   Then, if this song really is a medley, does anyone have any information on who first put it together? Could it date back to some earlier Irish singing group? (The McNulty Family comes to mind, but there were many more.)

Thanks all, Bob