Here's the Traditional Ballad Index entry on this song:

Cumberland Gap

DESCRIPTION: Stories of the settlement of Cumberland Gap. Texts may have a variety of verses, about exploration or the Civil War. The chorus is diagnostic: "Lay down boys and take a little nap; (Fourteen miles to the) Cumberland Gap."
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1924 (recording, Uncle "Am" Stuart, followed in the same year by recordings by Land Norris, Gid Tanner & Riley Puckett)
KEYWORDS: exploration settler Civilwar dancing dancetune
HISTORICAL REFERENCES:
1750 - Thomas Walker explores and names Cumberland Gap
Jun 18, 1862 - Union troops under G.W. Morgan occupy the Gap after James Rains (who is outnumbered by two to one) evacuates the pass
Sep 17, 1862 - Morgan evacuates the Gap, his retreat having been cut off by Bragg's and Kirby Smith's campaigns in Kentucky
Oct 22, 1862 - Confederate troops from Braxton Bragg's army occupy the Gap
Sept 10, 1863 - Confederates forced from the Gap by troops under Burnside. The Gap will remain in Union hands thereafter
FOUND IN: US(Ap,SE,So)
REFERENCES (14 citations):
Randolph 498, "Cumberland Gap" (1 fragment)
BrownIII 329, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text)
BrownSchinhanV 329, "Cumberland Gap" (1 tune plus a text excerpt)
Roberts, #51, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text, 1 tune)
Fuson, pp. 176-178, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text)
Silber-CivWarFull, pp. 227-228, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text, 1 tune)
Silber-CivWarAbbr, pp. 62-63, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text, 1 tune)
Lomax-ABFS, pp. 274-276, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text, 1 tune, composite)
Lomax-FSNA 80, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text, 1 tune)
Cohen-AFS1, p. 251, "Cumberlan Gap" (1 text)
Arnett, p. 31, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text, 1 tune)
Botkin-SoFolklr, p. 714, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text, 1 tune)
PSeeger-AFB, p. 67, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text, 1 tune)
Silber-FSWB, p. 49, "Cumberland Gap" (1 text)
ST R498 (Partial)
Roud #3413
RECORDINGS:
Dock Boggs, "Cumberland Gap" (on Boggs3, BoggsCD1)
Jack Burchett, "Cumberland Gap" (on WatsonAshley01)
Rufus Crisp, "Cumberland Gap" (on Crisp01)
The Hillbillies, "Cumberland Gap" (Vocalion 5024, rec. 1926)
Frank Hutchison, "Cumberland Gap" (OKeh 45570, 1932; rec. 1929)
Buell Kazee, "Cumberland Gap" [fragment] (on Kazee01)
[Byrd] Moore, [Richard] Burnett & [Leonard] Rutherford, "Cumberland Gap" (Gennett 6706/Champion 15653 [as Norton, Bond & Williams]/Supertone 9310 [as Southern Kentucky Mountaineers], 1929 -- a primarily instrumental version; on BurnRuth01, KMM)
Land Norris, "Cumberland Gap" (OKeh 40212, 1924)
Fiddlin' Powers and Family, "Cumberland Gap" (Victor, unissued, 1924)
Don Reno & Red Smiley, "Cumberland Gap" (King 5002, c. 1956)
Fiddlin' Doc Roberts Trio, "Cumberland Gap" (Conqueror 8239, 1933)
Pete Seeger, "Cumberland Gap" (on PeteSeeger07, PeteSeeger07a)
Arthur Smith, "Cumberland Gap" (on McGeeSmith1)
Uncle "Am" Stuart, "Cumberland Gap" [instrumental] (Vocalion 5035/Vocalion 14839, 1924)Gid Tanner & Riley Puckett, "Cumberland Gap" (Columbia 245-D, 1924)
Gid Tanner & His Skillet Lickers, "Cumberland Gap" (Columbia 15303-D, 1928)
Gordon Tanner, Smokey Joe Miller & Uncle John Patterson, "Medley: Cumberland Gap/Gid Tanner's Bucking Mule/Hen Cackle" (on DownYonder)
Wade Ward, "Cumberland Gap" [instrumental] (on Holcomb-Ward1)
Williamson Bros. & Curry "Cumberland Gap" (OKeh 45108, 1927)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Bonnie George Campbell" [Child 210] (tune)
cf. "Dogget's Gap"
cf. "Big Stone Gap" (form)
NOTES: This melody is played as a dance tune throughout the southeast. - PJS
Fuson's unusually long text has also been heavily localized: "September morn in Sixty-two... Morgan's 'Yankee' all withdrew." "They burned the hay, the meal, and meat... And left the rebels nothing to eat." "Braxton Bragg with his rebel band... He run George Morgan to the bluegrass land."
Union general George W. Morgan (1820-1893) had occupied the Gap on June 18, 1862 with a division after the oversized Confederate brigade of James E. Rains withdrew. (Rains, incidentally, did his own burning of stores as he pulled out.)
In September 1862, though, two Confederate armies under Braxton Bragg and Edmund Kirby Smith were moving into Kentucky (the Perryville campaign). Kirby Smith's force threatened Morgan's communications, and on September 17, he conducted an orderly evacuation. There was no battle, but it would be another year before the Union recaptured the Gap. - RBW
Last updated in version 4.2
File: R498

---

Go to the Ballad Search form
Go to the Ballad Index Song List

Go to the Ballad Index Instructions
Go to the Ballad Index Bibliography or Discography

The Ballad Index Copyright 2017 by Robert B. Waltz and David G. Engle.

---

Here are the lyrics we have in the Digital Tradition. Anybody know where they come from?

CUMBERLAND GAP
Me and my wife and my wife's pap.
We all live down in the Cumberland Gap.

cho: Cumberland Gap, Cumberland Gap.
We all live in the Cumberland Gap.

Cumberland Gap is a noted place
Three kinds of water to wash your face.

The first white man in the Cumberland Gap
Was doctor Walker, an English Chap.

Daniel Boone on Pinnacle Rock,
Killed many Injuns with his old flintlock.

Cumberland Gap is a noted place,
Three kinds of water to wash your face.

Daniel Boone on Pinnacle Rock,
He killed Injuns with 'his old flintlock.

Lay down, boys, and take a little nap.
Fo'teen miles to the Cumberland Gap

This is one of those songs that has many variations. One
variation was sung with North and one by the South in the
Civil War. Here is one I have heard with only 5 verses.
You can probably make up an equal number and be a safe
ground in the folk tradition.HX

@fiddle @dance
filename[ CUMBGAP
HX,AJS