The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #152117   Message #3556097
Posted By: GUEST,Lighter
04-Sep-13 - 01:00 PM
Thread Name: Sam Hall - 'one ball'?
Subject: RE: Sam Hall - 'one ball'?
Mudcat went offline in the middle of my post, so once again a page of valuable information must be reduced to a few lines.

The version of "Sam Hall" you speak of is, in principle, the common "Damn your eyes!" version with colorful alterations.

One way of beginning is:

Oh, my name is Sammy Hall, Sammy Hall.
Oh, my name is Sammy Hall
And I've only got one ball,
But it's better than fuck-all.
God damn your eyes!

Or you could sing "Captain Hall" or "none at all." Like anyone cares.

Now my question.

In his collection of sea shanties, Stan Hugill gave a censored two-stanza version in which, he said, stanza two concerned "amorous adventures" with "fancy women." His editors made him rewrite it because it was "unprintable" in 1961.

So here's what they did print:

Oh, me name is Bully Bose, Bully Bose,
Oh, me name is Bully Bose,
And me gal is Sarah Rose,
She's got jiggers in her toes.
Damn her eyes!

I can't imagine what Hugill actually heard. Can anyone? (I suppose "Billy Bunt" or "Deadeye Dick" would have been more promising heroes.)

("No Balls at All," of course, is an entirely different song.)