Lyr Req: Franklin

Subject: Franklin
From:
Date: 10 Jun 99 - 03:57 PM

Searching for the words of 'Franklin' not the version on Mudcat database called Lady Franklin's Lament, but the one about the man himself! Any offers ?

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Margo
Date: 10 Jun 99 - 04:44 PM

What man himself. You mean the one and only Benjamin Franklin? That's who I think of. I don't know any songs about him, but he did write music. Margarita

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Fadac
Date: 10 Jun 99 - 05:01 PM

Would you be talking about the Franklin, the ill fated artic explorer? He is mentoned in a song called "North West Passage" on a Victroy Sings at Sea, cd.

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Penny S
Date: 10 Jun 99 - 05:20 PM

If it was that ill-fated man, it is one of the few claims to fame of the spot where I live that it's where he left from.

Penny

Subject: RE: Franklin
From:
Date: 10 Jun 99 - 08:13 PM

There are 3 variant versions in DT, but they are from after his death. I don't know of any that might be about Franklin before he died.

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Barbara
Date: 10 Jun 99 - 10:37 PM

THE FRANKLIN EXPEDITION (in DT) is the same basic song and melody as Lady Franklin's lament, but is told from an unspecified male(?)POV. Is that what you are looking for? Or is it possible you want Bold Wolf(e), another song to that same tune?
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Barbara
Date: 10 Jun 99 - 10:42 PM

Excuse me, it's BRAVE Wolfe, or Bold General Wolfe.

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Alan of Australia
Date: 10 Jun 99 - 10:47 PM

G'day,
The only other song about Franklin I know of is Stan Rogers' "Northwest Passage", in the DT.

Cheers,
Alan

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Martin _Ryan
Date: 11 Jun 99 - 02:09 PM

I think Joanna Colcord's book (Songs the Whalemen Sang) has a fragment of a song about Franklin which does not fall into the "Lady Franklin" set. Liam's Brother will probably know!

Regards

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Martin _Ryan
Date: 11 Jun 99 - 05:59 PM

We sailed away down Baffin Bay
Where the nights and days were one
And the Huskimaw in his skin canoe
That was the only living soul

The ice king came with his eyes aflame
Perched on our noble crew
And his chilly breath was cold as death
It pierced our warm hearts through

That's the one I was thinking of. Its in "Ballads and Sea songs from Newfoundland" by Greenlea and Mansfield (?? I can't read my own handwriting!).

Collected from Stephen John Lewis of Fleur de Lys, 1929. ^^

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Martin _Ryan
Date: 12 Jun 99 - 06:35 AM

It strikes me that Lady Franklin's Lament was reduced to 4 or 5 verses which do not make clear that the woman is speaking, in the most popular version in Britain and Ireland - John Renbourn, Martin Carthy etc. That version is always known as "Lord Franklin".

Regards

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: John Moulden
Date: 12 Jun 99 - 08:45 AM

Joanna Colcord "Songs of American Sailormen" has (p 154) "Franklin's Crew" but this is the common one put partly in Lady Franklin's mouth. So far as I can see there is no version of any song about Franklin in Gale Huntington's "Songs the Whalemen Sang"

There are other songs about Franklin and I think I copied a ballad sheet recently but haven't time to look nat the moment.

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: John Moulden
Date: 12 Jun 99 - 04:46 PM

Lady Franklin's lament is Laws K9

It commonly has two different first lines:

It was homeward bound etc or Come ye seamen bold etc and the second verse begins - it was homeward bound

There is another song about Franklin which on ballad sheets was called "Lament of the fate of Sir J Franklin and his crews" it starts "You tender Christians pray attend"

Some references follow:

LAMENT OF THE FATE OF SIR J. FRANKLIN AND HIS CREWS You tender Christians I pray attend Baring-Gould Coll (British Library) Vol.5, No.216 Baring-Gould Coll

SIR J. FRANKLIN AND HIS CREW You tender Christians I pray attend Broadside facsimile orinted in Leslie Shepard, Broadside Ballad p.155 Text only

I have the second but have not seen the first.

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: John Moulden
Date: 12 Jun 99 - 04:47 PM

Damn, I meant printed.

Subject: Franklin
From: ORua
Date: 13 Jun 99 - 06:51 AM

Searching for a complete version of the song about Lord Franklin and his bootless search for the N-W passage. I know there is a fragment collected in Newfoundland, I know there is the Lady Franklin's Lament version, but I want more!

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: John Moulden
Date: 13 Jun 99 - 10:51 AM

I clarified this to an extent in another, and very recent, thread.

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Barbara
Date: 13 Jun 99 - 11:49 AM

Try this blue clicky thing, ORua. As thread titles get older they move down the page.
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Martin _Ryan
Date: 13 Jun 99 - 12:33 PM

Thanks,John.

Regards

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: liz randall
Date: 13 Jun 99 - 05:06 PM

I don't know what you call a fragment. Will this help:

Homeward bound one night on the deep
Rocked in my hammock I fell asleep
I dreamed a dream and I thought it treu
Concerning Franklin and his gallant crew.

With a hundred seamen he sailed away
Cross the western ocean in the month of May
To find passage around the pole
Where we poor seamen do sometimes go.

Through cruel hardships we made no go
Our ship on mountains of ice was yhrown
Where the eskimo in his skin canoe
Are the only ones who ever get through.

In Baffin Bay where the whale fish blow,
The fate of Franklin no man may know.
The fate of Franklin no man may tell
Lord Franklin along with his sailors do dwell.

And now my burden it gves me pain
For my long lost Franklin I would cross the main
Ten thousand pounds I would surely give
To know on earth that my Franklin do live.

Lovely song
Lizzie

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Martin _Ryan
Date: 13 Jun 99 - 08:27 PM

That's pretty much the Lord Franklin version, as recored by John Renbouirne in the late sixties?. Its a part of the Lady Franklin's Lament version. The question/s is/are - is there a tune for the rather awkward fragment I gave earlier - and is there yet another song?

Regards

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: John Moulden
Date: 14 Jun 99 - 12:28 PM

Martin, the awkward fragment is another bit of Lady Franklin's Lament which is actually quite a long song. When I get the time I'll transcribe the other ballad sheet version.

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Barbara
Date: 14 Jun 99 - 12:34 PM

Greenleaf and Mansfield say nothing about a separate tune for the fragment that you quoted above, but it doesn't scan easily to the melody to Lady Franklin.
They speak of their surprise at the interest generated by the vanishing of the Franklin Expedition (1845 - 1848), even many years later.
Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Martin _Ryan
Date: 14 Jun 99 - 03:29 PM

Thank you, John - I would be interested to see that sheet. No rush - put a photocopy behind the visor in the car - that's where I keep songs people have asked for!

Barbara
Certainly the fragment looks awkward - no matter what the tune is!

Now if the anonymous starter of the thread would only....

Regards

Subject: ADD: FRANKLIN AND HIS SHIP'S CREW^^
From: rich r
Date: 14 Jun 99 - 11:59 PM

Here's yet another version or two:

printed in "Maritime Folk Songs" by Helen Creighton (Ryerson Press 1961)

A. Fragment

We're homeward bound
Long in my hammock I fell asleep
I had a dream which I thought was true
Concerning Franklin and his ship's crew.

As we drew near to old England's shore
I overheard a fair maid comply,
She wept out loudly and seemed to say,
"Oh I have lost Franklin who's far away"

"But yet they are but one ship of fame
Which bore my Franklin across the main,
Five hundred seamen with courage stout,
To find the nor'western passage out."

To find a passage by the North Pole
Where lightning flashed and thunder rolled,
Through mountains of ice bothy her ships were

B.
A seaman bold that has withstood
While seas may roll on the briny flood,
That in those lines that I may gain (?)
Will put you in mind of a sailor's dream.

Homeward bound one night on the deep
Swang in my hammock I fell asleep,
I dreamt a dream, which I thought was true
Concerning Franklin and his bold crew.

As we drew near to old England's shore
I heard a lady that did implore,
She wept as loud and she seemed to say,
"Alas my Franklin is long away.

"Now since that time on ship of fame
It bears my husband across the main,
ONe hundred seamen that I may name
To find the north western passage through.

"To find a passage to the North Pole
Where seas to rage and the loud thunder roars,
"Tis more than any a man can do
With hearts undaunted and courage too.

"A sad foreboding, they gave me pain
Since my long-lost Franklin has crossed the main,
One hundred pounds I would freely give
To say on earth does my husband live."

Now since that time seven long years have passed
Through many's the keen and a bitter blast,
Threw over the graves where poor seamen fell,
Their dreadful sufferings no tongue can tell.

There's Captain Osborne of Scobrun town,
There's Crumswell Perry of fiery renown
There's Captain Osborne and as many's the more
That's long been searching the Arctic shore.

Now they sailed east and they sailed west,
To Greenland's coast to where they knew best
Through hardships and dangers they vain did strive
And on the mountains of Fife where their ships were drove.

In Baffin's Bay where the whale fish blow
The fate of Franklin nobody knows
There's manys the wife that is left to mourn
In grief and sorrow till they return.

rich r ^^

Subject: Lyr Add: LAMENT...SIR J FRANKLIN AND HIS CREWS^^
From: Martin _Ryan
Date: 12 Jul 99 - 06:02 PM

LAMENT ON THE FATE OF
SIR J FRANKLIN AND HIS CREWS

You tender Christians I pray attend
To these few lines that I have now penned
Of Sir John Franklin and his brave band
Who've perished far from their native land

So listen now while I tell to you
The fate of Franklin and his brave crew

It is now nine years since they first set sail
With joyous hearts and a pleasant gale
In frozen regions to cruise about
A North West passage to find out

There was many a sad and an aching heart
As from their friends these brave men did part
To plough their way o'er the raging main
For fear they should ne'er return again

When six dreary years they had been away
Some other vessels without delay
Were sent to search for the missing crews
But alas of them they could hear no news

A gloomy mystery for nine long years
Their wives and children has kept in tears
In deepest anguish they did await
The ships sent out to learn their fate

Poor Lady Franklin in great despair
In anguish wild she tore her hair
Saying "Ten thousand pounds I'd give for news
Of my loving Franklin and his brave crews.

The government in this present year
Did pensions give to their families dear
But Lady Franklin did refuse the grant
Crying "Give me my husband - I no money want"

At length sad tidings of this brave band
Has reached the shores of their native land
By which we hear that they all are dead
Though suffering much ere their souls had fled

As through the frozen seas they pushed
Their ships by blocks of ice were crushed
And offering prayers for their babes and wives
Many brave souls did lose their lives

Forty poor creatures from a watery grave
With one of the boats their lives did save
And over the ice they now took their way
To reach in safety the Hudson's Bay

What horrid sufferings of pain and want
Those frozen regions no food did grant
At length - o horrid- for want of meat
Their dying comrades they had to eat

How horrid was the sight when found
Their limbs and bodies lay scattered round
The flesh knawed (sic) off from every bone
Oh may their souls to heaven have gone

Now for to finish and make an end
May God their families from want defend
. And while their loss we sadly deplore
We hope such horrors to hear no more.

John Moulden pointed out the above version , from a broadsheet reproduced in Leslie Shepard's "The Broadside Ballad". Shephard dates it to circa 1859, published in London(?). No air given.

We're still left, it seems ot me, with the fragment collected by Greanleaf and Mansfield - which doesn't really appear in any of the other versions. The "ice-king" bit smacks of Coleridge's Ancient Mariner to me!

Regards^^

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Liam's Brother
Date: 12 Jul 99 - 07:06 PM

I was in the British Library in April of '78 and xeroxed a copy of a Henry Such broadside of the ballad to which John has referred. The only difference I see between it and what Martin has very kindly typed is that the 2nd verse starts "Now it's 15 years since he set sail."

All the best,
Dan

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Barry Finn
Date: 12 Jul 99 - 11:01 PM

Doerflinger has a couple nice versions & another nice version is in Palmer's. Palmer also has a version of the "Bold Adventurers of Captain Ross" the same Capt. Ross that led a rescue exp. for Franklin. I don't get it Ross had also been 3 years caught in the ICE, common occurence for those afflicted with severe Brain Freeze. 39 voyages had been launched to find Franklin, whose knows how many went after the Northwest Passage. Did these guys ever come home to puppy? Any excuse & bing-a-bang out the door & long gone for the sunny crystal blue frozen diamond hard pinpoint polar bear loving Club Med North & only a wee pot stove that just sank with the ship to beat off the unbareable heat. I can see how the seals leapt from the ice flows as the ship appeared over the horizon to greet the weary sailors with a bark & some vigorous sexy hand clapping something every mother's son strives for. Oh I missed something it may have been a macho way to get a song made after you, the price some people pay for fame, go figure. Barry

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Martin _Ryan
Date: 13 Jul 99 - 03:43 AM

Barry

Palmer's broadside is a fairly striaghtforward "Lady Franklin" set. I'd forgotten the Captain Ross song - do you have an air for it?

Regards

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Barry Finn
Date: 13 Jul 99 - 02:52 PM

It's in Palmer's but I haven't a clue as to how I'd read it never mind put it up. Barry

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Susanne (skw)
Date: 13 Jul 99 - 05:53 PM

Has Captain Ross anything to do with this man, Dr John Rae?

"There is a road in Stromness named after Franklin, but [Orkney author] George Mackay Brown once said it should be called Rae Road, for the real hero of the tragedy that wiped out the Franklin expedition was a Stromness man. [Dr John] Rae, chief trader with the Hudson Bay Company, played a major role in mapping out Northern Canada and was also the first man to discover what happened to the crews of the Erebus and Terror. [...] When he was asked to join the search for Franklin in 1847 he had just successfully charted 625 miles of coastline, travelling 1,200 miles on foot, living off the land. He was a loner. His relationship with his Navy colleagues on the Franklin search was an uneasy one. They could never understand a man who appeared to be as primitive as the natives, who copied the Eskimo way of life [...]. The 1847-48 expedition shed no new light on the fate of Erebus and Terror crews and the search dragged on long after hope of finding anyone alive had been abandoned. In April, 1854, while surveying the Boothia Peninsula, Rae found the first key to the Franklin mystery - and put himself in line for an award worth £ 10,000. At Pelly Bay he met an Eskimo, Innook-po-zhee-jook, who said he had heard stories from other natives of thirty-five or forty white men who had starved to death some years earlier, about twelve days' journey away. Later that year, it was established that the bodies had been found near the estuary of the Great Fish River. The Eskimos brought a mass of relics to Rae at Repulse Bay - one of Franklin's decorations, a small plate with his name on it, silver forks and spoons, a surgeon's knife, a gold watch, and other items. They also told Rae that Franklin's starving men had committed acts of cannibalism. When this news reached Britain the reaction was shock and disbelief. The writer Charles Dickens, while obviously believing that the 'treacherous and cruel' Eskimos might eat each other, thought it was 'in the highest degree improbable' that Englishmen would eat Englishmen. Doubt was cast on both Rae's discovery and on the cannibalism report, but the Orkney explorer held his ground. He got his £ 10,000, with £ 2,000 of it going to his men.
The house where John Rae spent his childhood ['The Haven'] can still be seen in Stromness [...]. In 1851, Lady Jane Franklin and her niece Sophia stayed at The Haven while visiting Stromness during the hunt for her missing husband. [...] At that time Lady Franklin had a high regard for the Orkneyman, but her admiration diminished after she had heard his report about members of the Franklin expedition engaging in cannibalism. (from Smith, The Whale Hunters, p49ff)

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Art Thieme
Date: 15 Jul 99 - 12:05 AM

...and in recent years some of Franklin's men were unearthed from the permafrost, tested, and found to be full of LEAD that had leached from the metal used to seal their canned provisions during the expedition. This lead poisoning caused the bizarre behavior that ultimately lead (no pun intended) to their making some lousy decisions which precipitated their demise. (This was in another thread too.)

Art

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Liam's Brother
Date: 15 Jul 99 - 12:39 AM

Art is quite right. This was the subject of a program of about an hour's length on U.S. Public Broadcasting System television.

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Fadac
Date: 15 Jul 99 - 03:27 PM

Yup, They were to have carried the ships piano in a lifeboat across the ice. Not what you need in a survial situation.

-Fadac

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Susanne (skw)
Date: 15 Jul 99 - 08:09 PM

The book by Owen Beattie and John (?) Geiger is called 'Frozen in time' (1987). Marvellous!

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Liam's Brother
Date: 16 Jul 99 - 12:02 AM

Hi Martin!

I got Roy Palmer's book for Bonnie a few years ago but in looking around the apartment tonight I couldn't find it. When I solve that mystery, I'll copy the melody for you. Will you be at the Paddy O'Brien Festival or the Fleadh?

All the best,
Dan

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Martin _Ryan
Date: 16 Jul 99 - 05:15 AM

Dan

I have Palmers book - no air is given.
I'm away most of August and not sure if I'll make either the Aonach or Fleadh.

Best Wishes to the gang.

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 12 Oct 00 - 12:45 PM

There is some further discussion, including the text from Palmer's book, in the middle of this thread:  The Ship in Distress

Subject: RE: Franklin
From: A Wandering Minstrel
Date: 13 Oct 00 - 11:30 AM

A really good book on Franklin and some of the other North West passage folks is "Barrows Boys" published earlier this year in paperback. My defective memory wont remind me of trhe author.

In addition to the Franklin and Ross expeditions it also gives an interesting counterpoint on the search for the source of the Niger.

Isnt it one of Franklins men who makes a re-appearance in James Taylors "The Frozen Man"?

Subject: Lyr Add: LADY FRANKLIN'S LAMENT (from Bodleian)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 12:26 AM

I don't think this version has been posted at Mudcat before:

From The Bodleian Library Broadside Ballad collection, Firth c.12(81):


LADY FRANKLIN'S LAMENT

My Franklin dear long has been gone,
To explore the northern seas.
I wonder if my faithful John
Is still battling with the breeze,
Or, if ever he will return again
To these fond arms once more,
To heal the wounds of his dearest Jane
Whose heart is grieved full sore.

CHORUS: My Franklin dear, though long thy stay,
Yet still my prayer shall be,
That Providence may choose a way
To guide thee safe to me.

My Franklin dear, where dost thou dwell?
What part of the frozen sea?
Oh, how I wish that I could tell,
I'd quickly haste to thee.
With my goodly ship in motion,
No longer here I'd stay,
But athwart the rolling ocean,
For thee I'd bear away.

My Franklin dear, I can but mourn
At thy long protracted stay.
Oh, would to God thou could'st return,
How bless'd would be that day!
The hearts of merry England
Would swell with joy once more
To welcome my lost husband
To his dear native shore.

The brave and good Lieutenant Pim*
Is now gone off to sea.
May Heaven's blessing go with him
To guide my love to me,
And if again he should return
To this fond heart once more,
He shall not cause his friends to mourn
Nor again his loss deplore.

My Franklin dear, once more safe home
Upon Britannia's shore,
To the northern seas no more shall steer
Where the cruel icebergs roar,
But once safe in his native home,
Bless'd by wife and children dear,
With bears and wolves no more to roam,
He'll be free and happy here.

My Franklin dear may be laid low
Amidst the icebergs drear.
The sad thought fills my heart with woe,
Yet one ray of hope is near,
That if I never meet him more,
In this world of hope and fears,
Yet we may meet on a happy shore
And wipe away our tears.

Wilson Printer Bideford

- - -
* Bedford Clapperton Trevelyan Pim, who later rose to the rank of Admiral.