Lyr Add: The Amphitrite

Subject: Lyr Add: THE AMPHITRITE
From: Conrad Bladey (Peasant- Inactive)
Date: 04 Mar 00 - 08:24 AM

Here is a very funny song that should be heard more!

THE AMPHITRITE

Frae Team gut to Whitley wi' coals black an' broon,
For the Amphitrite loaded, the keel had come doon:
But the bullies, ower neet had their thropples see wet,
That the nyem o' the ship yen an' a' did forget.

Chorus: Fal-de-ral...

To find oot the nyem, noo, each worried his chops,
An' claw'd at his hips fit to murder the lops--
Then the Skipper, went hunger'd was a'ways myest bright,
Swore the pawhogger luggish was ca'd Empty Kite.

Frae the Point, roond the Girt, a' the time sailin' slow,
Each bully kept bawlin', "The Empty Kite, ho!"
But their blairin' was vain, for nee Empty Kite there,
Tho' they blair'd till their kites were byeth empty an' sair.

A' Slaverin the Skipper ca'd Geordy an' Jim,
For to gan to Newcassel and ax the reet nyem;
The youngest he thowt myest, to blame i' this bore,
Sae Pee-Dee an' his marrow was seun pack'd ashore.

Up the Shields Road they trodg'd i' their myest worn-oot soles,
Oft cursin' the Empty Kite, Skipper, and coals;
At the sign of "The Coach" they byeth ca'd it befell,
To mourn their hard case owre a tankard o' yell.

Here a Buck at a sirloin hard eatin' was seen,
An' he said 'at the air'd myed his appetite keen;
"Appetite!" cried the bullies--like maislins they stared,
Wide gyepin' wi' wonder, till "Crikes!" Jemmy blair'd.

"The Appetite, Geordy! smash! dis tu hear that?
It's the varry ootlandish, cull nyem we forgat;
Bliss the dandy! for had he not tell't us the nyem,
To Newcassel we'd wander'd byeth weary and lyem!"

To Shields back they canter'd an' seun, frae the keel,
Roar'd--"The Appetite, ho!" 'neuf to frighten the De'il,
Thus they fund oot the ship, cast the coals in a sweat,
Still praisin' the Dandy they'd luckily met.

Then into the huddock, weel tir'd they a' gat,
An' of Empty Kite, Appetite, lang did they chat,
When the Skipper fund oot--(wise as Solomon, King)--
Tho' not the syem word--'twas aboot the syem thing.
^^

click for notation.

Click for MIDI

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: MMario
Date: 28 Oct 03 - 03:21 PM

The link at the bottom is broken on my computer - by any chance is it the tune?

Tune is "Gee Ho, dobbin" aka Cappy aka Swaggering boney; aka Joe Muggins

But the only copy I could find (at JC's - for Swaggering Boney) doesn't seem to fit this...

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 28 Oct 03 - 03:30 PM

The link was to an image of staff notation at an old address. Text, staff and midi can be found at Conrad's website: http://www.geocities.com/matalzi/priests3.html#The amphitrite

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: Joe Offer
Date: 28 Oct 03 - 04:14 PM

Hi, MMario - Mudcat is set to prevent the display of embedded images because they cause us too many problems - that's why you see a blank space where the sheet music ought to be. I'll change it to a link to the new location that Malcolm provided.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: GUEST,MMario
Date: 28 Oct 03 - 04:19 PM

okay - I'm still blocked from it - could someone harvest the tune? it's on "the list"

---

I suppose that "somebody" is me. Yer wish is my command, Cap'n.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: Joe Offer
Date: 28 Oct 03 - 06:00 PM

Tune added as requested. See tune link up top. I don't think it works for the other song with a related name, The Anford-Wright. That song comes from Cox's Folk-Songs of the South, which does not have a tune for the song. I'm guessing that Amphitrite, Anford-Wright, and Rounding the Horn are all about the same song?
-Joe Offer-

Here's some information from Malcolm (from this message):

103 AMPHITRI  THE ANFORD-WRIGHT
From Cox, Folk-Songs of the South. No tune was noted and this appears to be the only example found in tradition of an English broadside ballad,  Loss of the Amphitrite. Roy Palmer, Boxing the Compass, 2001, p. 206, gives details of the event of 1833 which inspired the piece.

---

Here's the entry from the Traditional Ballad Index:

Loss of the Amphitrite, The [Laws K4]

DESCRIPTION: The Amphitrite leaves port, bound for Australia. Two days out she runs aground and sinks, killing all the passengers and most of the crew. The singer and two others survive by clinging to a spar (though one of them dies later)
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1917 (Cox; there are older, undated broadsides)
KEYWORDS: ship wreck
HISTORICAL REFERENCES:
1833 - The Amphitrite, carrying female convicts to Australia, runs aground near Boulogne; only three sailors are saved
FOUND IN: US(Ap)
REFERENCES (3 citations):
Laws K4, "The Loss of the Amphitrite"
JHCox 87, "The Anford-Wright" (1 text)
DT 740, AMPHITRI
Roud #301
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Rounding the Horn" (subject)
Notes: Cox gives a contemporary description of the storm in which the Amphitrite sank. - RBW
File: LK04

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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 28 Oct 03 - 06:34 PM

It's unlikely, I should say, that there's any relationship at all between the comic Amphitrite here and the broadside song made on a real shipwreck; though the name of the latter may perhaps have suggested the name of the former. Equally, Rounding the Horn is not related to either, and indeed only one version of it found in tradition even mentions an Amphitrite. I have my own ideas about how that name got into this last song, and what may be a more likely candidate for the ship; but you'll have to wait for that until The Penguin Book of English Folk Songs, re-branded as Classic English Folk Songs, is published by EFDSS (in time for Christmas, we hope).

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: fogie
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 05:48 AM

Rounding of the horn reminds me of the spoof song-
The gallant frigate Araldite
Lay stuck in Plymouth sound!
thats all folks

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: GUEST,MMario
Date: 29 Oct 03 - 08:33 AM

Thanks Joe! (Actually - anyone who could have reached the site could have sent the stuff to me and I would have done the work. - I just couldn't GET to the bloody thing...I can't reach his site from home either - don't know why.)

will be updating the tune hunt list shortly.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: beardedbruce
Date: 28 Mar 06 - 11:37 AM

no idea why the previous post got here, but as long as this thread is resurrected...

http://www.spanamwar.com/Amphitrite.htm

"AMPHITRITE was decommissioned in 1919 and sold in 1920, being converted into a floating hotel. She was scrapped in 1952 "

A hotel with 4 10inch guns??

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: beardedbruce
Date: 28 Mar 06 - 12:13 PM

OK, so they took the guns off.


But "The lack of reserve buoyancy (20% instead of the 80% of a more typical warship) made travel on the open seas somewhat dangerous. "?

seems like something a floating hotel should worry about...

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: beardedbruce
Date: 28 Mar 06 - 12:40 PM

"In the spring of 1950, the Amphitrite was towed to Baltimore, MD and was to be used as a restaurant and hotel at the new Chesapeake Bridge at Sandy Point. Business was slow and she was sold in 1951 and taken back to Baltimore to be refitted as a support ship for oil exploration in Venezuela, the project was never started."



Or for those in the UK,

http://www.battleships-cruisers.co.uk/images/amphitrite.jpg

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Amphitrite
From: GUEST,Ray
Date: 03 Nov 11 - 01:01 PM

I thought that this might be of some interest.

I came across these Lyrics in a copy of the "Shields Daily News", from April 30th., 1872, while doing some research into my family history.
Before listing the Lyrics, the newspaper article says the following:

"The old ship Amphitrite, now stranded near the Soutn Pier (of the Tyne at South Shields), was once the subect of a famous local song, which for some years was very popular in this district, but whihc has to a great extent, gone out of the rememberance of the present generation. As an illustration of the humour of the local song writers of that day, we reprint the verses in question".

Whether the song actually relates to the ship which was stranded in the mouth of the Tyne in 1872 I don't know, but it clearly couldn't have been the same ship as was scrapped in 1952.

Subject: Lyr Add: LOSS OF THE AMPHITRITE (from Bodleian)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 05 Nov 11 - 01:30 PM

Obviously there has been more than one ship named the Amphitrite. This is about one of them, the same one mentioned in the Traditional Ballad Index.

From the Bodleian ballad collection, Johnson Ballads 1947. (I have added punctuation.)


LOSS OF THE AMPHITRITE

Come list, you gallant Englishmen who ramble at your ease,
While I unfold the horrors and the dangers of the seas.
It's of the ship, the Amphitrite, with a hundred and eight females
And children, crew, and cargo, bound all for New South Wales.

'Twas on August 25th we sail'd from Woolwich shore,
Leaving our friends behind us, whose hearts were grievéd sore.
Along the shore away we bore till friends were out of sight,
Who crying said, "Adieu, poor girls aboard the Amphitrite!"

We sail'd away without delay and arriv'd off Dungeness,
But when we came off port Boulogne, then great was our distress.
On Friday morning, the fourth day, O, what a horrid sight!
Who crying said, "Adieu, poor girls aboard the Amphitrite!"[*]

Our captain found she was near aground, her anchor did let go,
Crying, "Set your main and topsails, boys, or soon your fate you'll know!"
The raging sea ran mountains high; the tempest did unite.
Poor souls in vain did shriek with pain on board the Amphitrite.

At three o'clock in the afternoon, we were put to a stand.
Our fatal ship she ran aground upon a bank of sand.
Poor children round their parents hung, who tore their hair with fright
To think that they should end their days on board the Amphitrite.

Our moments they were ending fast, and all prepared to die.
We on our bended knees did fall, and loud for mercy cry.
Our ship she gave a dreadful roll and soon went out of sight.
O, the bitter cries could reach the skies on board the Amphitrite!

Great praise belongs unto the French who tried us all to save.
Our captain he was obstinate to brave the stormy wave,
But he went down among the rest all in the briny sea,
The rocks beneath the pathless deep his pillow for to be.

The crew were toss'd and all were lost but two poor lads and me,
For on a spar we reach'd the shore and dar'd the raging sea,
But one exhausted by the waves, he died that very night,
So only two were sav'd o' the crew of the fatal Amphitrite.

So now the Amphitrite is gone, her passengers and crew.
O, think upon the sailor bold that wears the jacket blue!
God grand relief to end the grief of those distracted quite,
Lamenting sore for those no more on board the Amphitrite.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
N. B.—The above ship was lost off Boulogne, August 31, 1833, having on board 108 female convicts, who perished, together with twelve children, and thirteen of the crew!
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
W. & T. Fordyce, Printers, Dean Street, Newcastle.
To be had also at: No. 43, Myton Gate, Hull.


[* I find it odd that this line is identical to the last line of the previous verse. It doesn't fit here; there is no antecedent for "who." It makes me suspect it is a clumsy substitution for some line that was forgotten or inadvertently omitted.—JD]

Subject: Lyr Add: THE FEMALE CONVICT SHIP (Thomas H Bayly)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 07 Nov 11 - 06:40 PM

This poem is about the same disaster, although it doesn't mention the name of the ship. In an 1874 edition of this poem, the title was changed to THE LOSS OF THE AMPHITRITE

From The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 22, No. 635. (London: J. Limbird, November 30, 1833), page 363:


THE FEMALE CONVICT SHIP.
By Thomas Haynes Bayly

1. The tide is in, the breeze is fair,
The vessel under weigh;
The gallant prow glides swiftly on,
And throws aside the spray;
The tranquil ocean, mirror-like,
Reflects the deep blue skies;
And, pointing to the destin'd course,
The straighten'd pennon flies.

2. Oh! none of those heart-cradled prayers
That never reach the lip,
No benedictions wait upon
That fast-receding ship:
No tearful eyes are strain'd to watch
Its progress from the land;
And there are none to wave the scarf,
And none to kiss the hand.

3. Yet women throng that vessel's deck—
The haggard, and the fair.
The young in guilt, and the depraved,
Are intermingled there!
The girl, who from her mother's arms
Was early lured away;
The harden'd hag, whose trade hath been
To lead the pure astray!

4. A young and sickly mother kneels
Apart from all the rest;
And with a song of home she lulls
The babe upon her breast.
She falters,—for her tears must flow,—
She cannot end the verse;
And naught is heard among the crowd
But laughter, shout, or curse!

5. 'Tis sunset. Hark! the signal gun;—
All from the deck are sent—
The young, the old, the best, the worst.
In one dark dungeon pent!
Their wailings, and their horrid mirth,
Alike are hush'd in sleep:
And now the female convict-ship
In silence ploughs the deep.

6. But long the lurid tempest-cloud
Hath brooded o'er the waves;
And suddenly the winds are roused.
And leave their secret caves;
And up aloft the ship is borne,
And down again as fast;
And every mighty billow seems
More dreadful than the last,

7. Oh! who that loves the pleasure-barque,
By summer breezes fann'd.
Shall dare to paint the ocean-storm,
Terrifically grand?
"When helplessly the vessel drifts,
Each torn sail closely furl'd;
When not a man of all the crew
Knows whither she is hurl'd

8. And who shall tell the agony
Of those confined beneath,
Who in the darkness dread to die—
How unprepared for death!
Who, loathing, to each other cling
When every hope hath ceased.
And beat against their prison door,
And shriek to be released!

9. Three times the ship hath struck. Again!
She never more will float.
Oh! wait not for the rising tide;
Be steady—man the boat.
And see, assembled on the shore,
The merciful, the brave;—
Quick, set the female convicts free.
There still is time to save!

10. It is in vain! what demon blinds
The captain and the crew?
The rapid rising of the tide
With mad delight they view.
They hope the coming waves will waft
The convict ship away!
The foaming monster hurries on.
Impatient for his prey!

11. And He is come! the rushing flood
In thunder sweeps the deck!
The groaning timbers fly apart.
The vessel is a wreck!
One moment from the female crowd
There comes a fearful cry;
The next, they're hurl'd into the deep.
To struggle, and to die!

12. Their corses strew a foreign shore,
Left by the ebbing tide;
And sixty in a ghastly row
Lie number'd, side by side!
The lifeless mother's bleeding form
Comes floating from the wreck;
And lifeless is the babe she bound
So fondly round her neck!

13. 'Tis morn;—the anxious eye can trace
No vessel on the deep;
But gather'd timber on the shore
Lies in a gloomy heap:
In winter time those brands will blaze
Our tranquil homes to warm,
Though torn from that poor convict ship
That perish'd in the storm!

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