CROOKED JACK:        Dominic Behan, 1965, Coda Music Ltd.

(Notes by Dominic: Eamonn Smullen, a good Republican Socialist, worked on the Hydro' Electric scheme in Inverary, Scotland. He described conditions under which the men worked as appalling.)

Come Irishmen both young and stern
With adventure in your soul,
There are other ways to spend your days
Than working down a hole,

CHORUS:
I was tall and true, all of six foot two
Till they broke me across the back,
By a name I'm known that's not my own
For they call me Crooked Jack.

The ganger's blue eyed pet I was,
Big Jack could do no wrong,
And the reason simply was because
I could work hard hours and long.
CHORUS:

I saw men old before their time,
Their faces drawn and grey,
I never thought so soon would mine,
Be lined the selfsame way.
CHORUS:

I cursed the day I went away,
To work on the hydro' dams,
Our sweat and tears, our hopes and fears,
Bound up in shuttering jamms.
CHORUS:

They'll say that honest toil is good
For the spirit and the soul,
But believe me boys it's for sweat and blood,
That they want you down that hole,
CHORUS