The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #65500   Message #4073084
Posted By: GUEST,henryp
25-Sep-20 - 12:27 PM
Thread Name: Origins: Some Rival Has Stolen My True Love Away
Subject: RE: Origins: Some Rival Has Stolen My True Love Away
Some titles;
Love's Fierce Desire, etc - Roxburgh Collection (Ballad Society, Vol. vi., pp. 67 and 69), circa 1656; begins;
Now the Tyrant hath stolen my dearest away
Some tyrant has stolen my true love away - from Sussex
A merry king has stolen my true love away - from Sussex
The Americans have stolen my true love away - from Sussex
Some rival has stolen my true love away - Broadwood, L, 1908, English Traditional Songs and Carols, Sung by Mr. Lough, Dunsford, 1898.
I can't find a Dunsford in Sussex, but there is a Dunsfold in Surrey, close to the West Sussex border.
The Rifles have stolen my true love away

Narthen included The Rifles in 2018 on their No Masters album Narthen. The booklet states; This song was collected from the King Family of Castle Eaton in Wiltshire by Alfred Williams [VWML AW/6/129]. It was first published in 1915 as part of a serialisation, and then in his collection Folk Songs of the Upper Thames [ Wiltshire 949 ] , published in 1923. This version has been set by John Tams to a variant of the tune for Farewell to Tarwathie.