The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #116137 Message #2510684
Posted By: Richie
09-Dec-08 - 09:43 AM
Thread Name: Origins: The authors of the 'Carter Family songs'
Subject: Lyr Add: MY CLINCH MOUNTAIN HOME
"My Clinch Mountain Home" was reported to be the first song A.P. wrote: Wanting to earn enough money to buy himself a piece of land, A.P. left his home in 1911 and set out for Richmond, Indiana (as his father had done), to work on the railroad but came down with typhoid fever and quickly returned home. Family members recall that he wrote his first song while he rode the train back to Virginia, "My Clinch Mountain Home," a nostalgic ode to the place of his birth that would become one of the Carter's hits:
Carry me back to old Virginny,
Back to my Clinch Mountain home;
Carry me back to old Virgininy,
Back to my old mountain home.
The family claim that A.P. wrote the song may be correct but the chorus and sentiment are based on James A. Bland's 1878 song
"Carry Me Back to Old Virginny." The verse is the melody of the "Battleship of Maine."
MY CLINCH MOUNTAIN HOME- Carter family
Far away on the hills
To a sunny mountainside
Many years ago we parted
My little Ruth and I
From this sunny mountainside
She clung to me and trembled
When I told her we must part
She said "Don't go, my darling
it almost breaks my heart
To think of you so far apart"
Carry me back to old Virginny
Back to my Clinch Mountain home
Carry me back to old Virginny
Back to my old Mountain home
Well, a-le-ho, le-ho-lay-ee
Well, a-le-ho, le-ho-lee
Yeah, lee-oh-lay-ee-hee
Oh, my mountain home
I folded my arms around her
Leaned her head against my breast
I told her I would wed her
When I came back from the west
At my old Clinch Mountain home
In my hand I hold a picture
Of the old home far away
In the other one my sweetheart
I'm thinking of today
On the sunny mountainside
Carry me back to old Virginny
Back to my Clinch Mountain home
Carry me back to old Virginny
Back to my old Mountain home
Well, a-le-ho, le-ho-lay-ee
Well, a-le-ho, le-ho-lee
Yeah, lee-oh-lay-ee-hee
Oh, my mountain home
[INSTRUMENTAL BREAK]
My mother's old and feeble
My father's getting gray
I'm going back to Virginia
And I expect to stay
At my old Clinch Mountain home
[CHORUS]