Lyr Add: The Finger Post

Subject: Lyr Add: THE FINGER POST
From: GUEST,Tomas mac Cormaic
Date: 01 Sep 07 - 10:28 AM

This ballad of '98 enjoyed great popularity in Cork City during the 1880's. Phil Carty (Mc Carthy) was hung at the Finger Post in Douglas, Co. Cork.
^^
The Finger Post

The Finger Post, where walks the ghost
Of Phil Carty, the Rapparee,
Who hung in chains from its pointing vanes,
Is now but a fallen tree.

'Twas in '98, oh! that dire defeat,
When they fled to hill and sea;
When the bog and glen hid the hunted men
Who fought for liberty.

Phil Carty, the, with the captured men
From the prison by the Lee,
Led to Convict's hulk, by Spike Island's bulk
On the voyage to Botany.

He gave one look at old Donnybrook,
His home when he was free;
The stars were bright, but his mothers light
Showed steady and plain to see.

With one blow he laid his foe,
On a Yeoman's horse was he;
He tore up then through the bushy glen
To the home that used to be.

The soldiers fired, the horse was tired,
A hit, a crash – they fall;
His heart it bled from the cruel lead,
The well-aimed musket ball.

The Finger Post, where walks his ghost,
They made his gallows tree;
His blood dripped bright, as he faced the light
Of the mother he'd never see.

So raise the post for Phil Carty's ghost
To stand by his gallows tree;
To look at night for his mother's light –
The light he'll never see.

When the wind blows low, he cheats the foe,
When high, on the gallows tree;
You'll hear the chains and his last remains –
So a prayer and a tear give ye.

Subject: Lyr Add: The Finger Post
From:
Date: 01 Sep 07 - 12:42 PM

Added Lyr Add so the workers can find it