The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #428   Message #3909407
Posted By: Lighter
04-Mar-18 - 11:21 AM
Thread Name: Origins: Cumberland Gap
Subject: RE: Origins: Cumberland Gap
Thanks for posting, Joe.

I did a little poking around and found the following in Keystone Folklore Quarterly II (Spring, 1957), p. 24, coll. by Henry W. Shoemaker:

The first white man in Cumberland Gap,
The first white man in Cumberland Gap,
The first white man in Cumberland Gap,
Was Doc Tom Walker, a Virginia chap.

Refrain: Lay down,boys, and take a little nap,
         They're raising cain in Cumberland Gap.

Daniel Boone on Pinnacle Rock,
He killed Indians with an old flintlock.

Cumberland Gap is a noted place,
They's three kinds of water to wash your face.

Cumberland Gap with its cliffs and rocks,
Home of the panther, bear, and fox.

Me and my wife and little chap,
All made a living in Cumberland Gap.

September morn in sixty-two,
Morgan's "Yanks" they all withdrew.

They spiked "Long Tom" on the mountain top,
And over the cliffs they let him drop.

They burned the hay, the meal, and meat,
And left the "Johnnies" nothing to eat.

Braxton Bragg with his "Secesh" band,
He run old Morgan to the blue grass land.

The "Johnnies" now will give their yell,
They'll scare the "Yankees" all to hell.

Shoemaker's note:

"From the singing of 'Roaring Joe' Campbell, Ario Pardee's chief log driver, Loyalsockville, Lycoming County [Pennsylvania], about 1880-1890."

Shoemaker (1880-1958) either learned the song as a child or got it from someone who'd known Campbell.