"South Australia"

According to Gibb's analysis and categories, "South Australia" is a "call-response-call-response form (with the 2 "pull points" per response), & mock chorus." He says, "The "mock chorus" is structured and timed just like the call-response section, and the only reasons it appears as a chorus are 1) Everyone sings together 2)The lyrics repeat each time round."

Here is a summary of the references to "South Australia" and its variant "The Codfish Shanty" in this thread *so far*, with all of the other bibliographic references that I have been able to find. Please note that I did find a source for the "We're bound for Californiay!" variant. It was in Shay's book, but he gives no information or dating on it. Also note the snippets from Google Book Search from SPIN MAGAZINE. It's unfortunate that this is not online. I think it would give us a lot of information about some of the ongoing "Hugill Mysteries".

{late 1860's} Harding's "The Codfish Shanty" S. Hugill, SHANTIES FROM THE SEVEN SEAS, (1961)

{1863-1903} "Heave Away", J.S. Scott, from London, THE JAMES M. CARPENTER COLLECTION, (1929), "Don't you hear what the Captain say..."

{sometime between 1872 and 1874} William Laurie of Sailor's Snug Harbor, William Doerflinger, SONGS OF THE SAILOR AND LUMBERMAN (first published in 1951 as SHANTYMEN AND SHANTYBOYS) 1990, p.70-71, "originated, probably, in the British emigrant ships that ran out to Melbourne and Sydney, Australia, carrying their hundreds of homesick colonists halfway round the globe to less crowded lands beneath the Southern Cross."(Doerflinger)

{1874} Frederik Pease Harlow, THE MAKING OF A SAILOR, OR SEA LIFE ABOARD A YANKEE SQUARE-RIGGER, (1928), Harlow mentions a shipmate named Dave who claims to have sung "South Australia" on board the clipper ship "Thermopylae" in 1874 (p. 220)

{1875} Frederik Pease Harlow, CHANTEYING ABOARD AMERICAN SHIPS, (1962), "chanteying" aboard the "Akbar" (pp. 33-35)

{1879-1908} Reece Baldwin, of South Wales, England, THE JAMES M. CARPENTER COLLECTION, (1928) "Have you seen my bowery queen..."

{1888} Laura Smith, MUSIC OF THE WATERS, from a "coloured seaman at the "Home"

{1889-1901} Joanna Colcord, ROLL AND GO - SONGS OF THE AMERICAN SAILORMEN (1924), "probably belongs to the days of the British wool-clippers, which ran between London and Melbourne or Sydney." (p. 86 of the 1964 edition,)

{1902} "South Australia", a poem by Charles Keeler A WANDERER'S SONGS OF THE SEA, with "Heave away, haul away" chorus line.

{1912-1942} "Haul Away, I'm a Rolling King", Lydia Parrish, SLAVE SONGS OF THE GEORGIA SEA ISLANDS (1942)

{1915-1948} "Cape Cod Girls", Frank Shay, AMERICAN SEA SONGS AND CHANTEYS (1948) has chorus: "We're bound for Californiay!" (p. 84)

{1927} William Saunders, "Folk Songs of the Sea", MUSICAL OPINION AND MUSIC TRADE REVIEW, London, July, 1927, p. 985, "Cape Cod Girls"

{1930's} Stan Hugill, SHANTIES FROM THE SEVEN SEAS, (1961), (p. 193-196}

SPIN, Volumes 1-4; - Page 15, Volumes 1-4; - Page 15, 1962
AUSTRALIA (CAPSTAN SHANTY) South End gals don't wear any frills, They're skinny and tight as a finny addie's gills. Our Old Man don't set no sail, He's a Liverpool man wid a salt-fish's tail... ... an ' we're bound for California.

{1966-1967} "We Are Bound Down South Alibama", Roger Abrahams DEEP THE WATER, SHALLOW THE SHORE, (1974), sung by the whalers of Barouallie, (p. 110)

SPIN, Volumes 7-9; - Page 32, 1969
Hooray, you're a lanky I I'm bound for South Australia '. What makes you call me
a ruler and king ? Heave away ! haul away 'Cause I'm married to an Indian ...

{1969} Stan Hugill SHANTIES AND SAILORS SONGS, p. 59,

        "Gold was found in Australia in 1851-53, [just prior to the sailing of the "Julia Ann"] but until an agricultural peace fell on that up-to-then wild country of convicts and bush-rangers, no regular shipping companies supplied the needs of the people of the "Colonies" as sailors called Australia. The ships of Green and Dunbar, however, made occasional passages out to Sydney in between Oriental voyages. With the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 and the new-fangled "tin-kettles" taking over the China tea trade, many of the clippers and the newly found Baines' Blackball line began to carve regular trade routes between the Mother Country and the Colonies. Apart from the capstan shanty "South Australia", no new work-songs were produced in these ships either, and many authorities feel that even this song, more than likely, started life in the days of the California gold rush, since versions are to be found giving:
   
   Heave away, haul away!
   And we're bound for California!"   
---
And here is a note from one of Gibb's posts above:

"To my mind, Colcord's 1924 version *must* be copied out of LA Smith. (And I always like to remind how much of Smith's work was plagiarized from the 1882 article, suggesting that even more of it was "culled" from other sources.) And I would not be surprised if Saunders culled his Codfish version "recently received from America" from Colcord -- either that, or the song was very well standardized around that time. Hugill's text version of South Australia/Rolling King looks to be a mash of all the sources he'd *read*, if not also what he used to sing/hear."   [Gibb: 30 Jan 10 - 01:46 PM]

There is certainly some basis for claiming that this chanty has African-American sources, both in its framework of call/response, and in some of its lyrical themes, as well as in its lack of a coherent story line. Also, it shows up in two later African-Amerian collections from the Georgia Sea Islands (Parrish) and the West Indies (Abrahams). On this basis, one could argue that the "shape" of it probably goes back to the 1850's period. However, the earliest documented date is *maybe* sometime in the late '60's, depending on when Harding learned his version of "Cape Cod Girls", and perhaps the early '70's according to Harlow.   

We have no data that places this song in San Francisco at the time of the Gold Rush, nor do we have any data that places it on the traders between San Francisco and Australia. And it is interesting that it does not show up in the Clive Carey Collection from Australia (Warren Fahey). [I am choosing to ignore the A.L. Lloyd reference because it has been impossible to pin it down.]