Subject: Unfortunate Rake (from Belden)
From:
Jim Carroll
Date: 23 Jun 18 - 09:01 AM
There you go
Can't include the tune, but if you want, I'll e-mail it to you
Jim
The Unfortunate Rake
This is an adaptation to the cattle range of a British stall ballad on the death and burial of a soldier ‘disordered’ by a woman. Such printed it as ‘The Unfortunate Lad,’ whose comrades find him ‘down by Lock Hospital'* wrapp’d in flannel, so hard is his fate.’ He states the situation adequately: Had she but told me when she disordered me,
Had she but told me of it in time,
I might have got salts and pills of white mercury,
But now I’m cut down in the height of my prime, and proceeds to order his funeral:
Muffle your drums, play your pipes merrily,
Play the dead march as you go along,
And fire your guns right over my coffin,
There goes an unfortunate lad to his home.
It is reported as traditional song from Yorkshire (JFSS I 254) and Somen (JPSS IV 326). It is perhaps originally Irish; Joyce (OIFMS No. 442) gives a tune and one stanza as ‘sung in Cork about the year 1790.’ More frequently recorded is a form in which the sexes are reversed, ‘The Young Girl Cut Down in her Prime.’ This has been reported from traditional singing in Hertfordshire (JFSS V 193-4), Oxfordshire (JFSS IV 326), Hampshire (JFSS IV 325-6), and on this side of the water in Nova Scotia (SBNS 219-20, BSSNS 301, JAFL XXV 277) and Maine (BFSSNE XI 18). The cowboy adaptation is widely known. It is No. 952 in Wehman’s series of single-sheet ballads. Texts have been reported from Nova Scotia (BSSNS 302), Maine (BFSSNE VIII 16-7), Massachusetts (JAFL XXV 277, BFSSNE VII 16—from Kansas), Pennsylvania (NPM 196-7, remade for lumberjacks), Virginia (SharpK II 164-5, SCSM 354-6, 358), West Virginia (JAFL XXV 154, FSS 242-6, FSWV 24-6), Kentucky (FSMEU 209-10), North Carolina (SCSM 356-8, FSSH 360), Mississippi (JAFL XXV 153-4), Illinois (ABS 170-1, by way of Wyoming, TSSI 181-4), Iowa (MAFLS XXIX 103-5), Nebraska (Thorp’s Songs of the Cowboys 41-4, where a headnote says: ‘Authorship credited to Troy Hale, Battle Creek, Nebraska’), North Dakota (JAFL XXII 258-9), and Montana Margaret Larkin’s Singing Cowboy 14-5, where drum and fife are replaced by rope and spurs). ‘The Dying Cowboy’ mentioned by Jones KNR 300 as known in Michigan is probably this song. Sandburg includes it in ASb and Lomax in CS, and Barry (BFSSNE VIII 16) notes that Mrs. Flanders printed a text from Vermont in the Springfield Sunday Union for 4 March, 1934. These cowboy versions seldom if ever ascribe the cowboy’s death to the cause so lucidly stated in the British stall print. He has indeed taken to bad courses, has drunk and gambled; and now he has been shot. And the scene, naturally, is not a hospital. Some location is almost always given, most often a barroom.
note: It is not clear whether ‘White Copper Alley,’ reported by Miss Broadwood from Hampshire (JFSS III 292, a single stanza), belongs with ‘The Unfortunate Rake’ or with ‘The Young Girl Cut Down in her Prime. ’
ín one of the Virginia texts (SharpK II 164, where the man is not a cowboy but a sailor) and in one of Lomax’s (CS 420-1) the original scene, or rather a memory of it, has been retained: ‘Saint James’s hospital.’
A
‘The Cowboy.’ From the manuscript ballad-book of Mrs. Lida Jones of Dade County, secured by Miss Lowry in 1906. The manuscript is defective in stanza 2, and I have made restorations in brackets. The name at the end is probably that of the supplier of the text. As I rode down to Letheric Barren,
To Letheric Barren so early one morn,
’Twas there I spied a handsome young cowboy
All dressed in white linen, all clothed for the grave.
Chorus:
‘Then beat the drum lowly and play the fife slowly,
And play the dead march as they bear me away,
Then take me to the graveyard and lay the sod o’er me,
For I’m a young cowboy, and I know I’ve done wrong.
‘ ’Twas once in my saddle I used to go dashing,
’Twas once in my saddle I used to [go by, ]
I first took to card playing and th[en to hard drinking,]
Got shot in the body, and now I mu[st die.]
‘Go write me a letter to my gray-headed mother,
And gently bear the news to my sister so dear;
But there’s another that’s dearer than a sister;
Who’ll bitterly weep when she finds that I am here.
‘Go gather around you a band of young cowboys
And tell them the history of a comrade so dear.
Then teach one another, before you go further,
To stop their wild roving before ’tis too late.
‘ Go bring me a glass, a glass of cold water,
A glass of cold water, ’ the poor boy said.
But when he returned his soul had departed,
Had gone to the giver; the cowboy was dead.
(Nannie W. Dick)
B
‘The Dying Cowboy.’ Reported by C. H. Williams from Bollinger County in 1906. Text closely similar to A, but lacks the second and fourth stanzas. The place-name is different from that in any other text known to me: As I walked down the Curis Viron
The Curis Viron so early one day—
C
‘The Dying Cowboy.’ Sent to me in 1909 by George F. Nardin of Vandalia. Audrain County. It is the text, he says, ‘as I used to sing it. ’ Does not differ from A except in the location: As I went down to a London bar room—
D
‘The Cowboy Song.’ Communicated in 1909 by E.E. Chiles, who says it was ‘given by a section boss named Hughes to Miss Mamie Griffen (age 12), and copied by her. Cedar City, Callaway County.’ Apparently Hughes’s was a printed text. It is similar to B except in the place-name: As I rode down to Lafferry, Lafferry,
As I rode down to Lafferry one day—
E
‘The Cowboy’s Lament.’ Reported by Miss Newell in 1912 as 'copied from a printed sheet owned by Mrs. T. B. Chandler’ of Farmington, St. Francois County. ‘A friend gave her the sheet,’ Miss Newell says, ‘about fifteen years ago, but she had known the song from the time she could remember.’ The text as copied does not fit the tune, lacking the repeat of the place-name, which I have inserted in the notation of the tune. ‘Latern in Barin’ is no doubt the same place as the ‘Letheric Barren’ of A, and the ‘Lathan’s bar room’ of H.
TUNE MISSING
As I rode down to Latern in Barin
So early one day,
’Twas there I espied a handsome young cowboy
All dressed in white linen and clothed for the grave.
Chorus:
‘Then play your fife lowly, and beat your drum slowly,
And play the dead march as you carry me along;
Go take me to the graveyard and place the sod o’er me,
For I’m a young cowboy, and I know I’ve done wrong.
* ’Twas once in my saddle I used to go dashing,
’Twas once in my saddle I used to be gay;
But first I took to drinking and then to card playing,
Got shot through the body, so now I must die.
‘Go gather all around you a crowd of young cowboys
, And tell them the history of this my fate;
Go tell them to stop their deep, deep drinking
And all their wild ways before it’s too late.
‘Go write a letter to my grayheaded mother,
And bear the news gently to my sister so dear.
But then there’s another far dearer than a mother;
She’ll bitterly weep when she knows I am here.
‘Go bring me a cup, a cup of cold water,
Of pure cold water,’ the poor fellow said;
But when I returned the spirit had departed
And gone to the Giver—the cowboy was dead.
F
No title. Reported by Miss Pauline Pfeiffer in 1918 as learned at Piggott, Arkansas, from Mrs. Will Reves, ‘who got it from her father, who lives in Kentucky. ’ So early one mornin’ I went cow lowin’,
So early one morning I went over there.
I met a young cowboy all dressed in white linen,
With clear blue eyes and dark wavy brown hair.
Chorus:
‘Beat the drum lowly, play the fife sadly,
Play the dead march as they carry me on.
Take me to the graveyard, pour the sod o’er me;
For I’m a young cowboy, I know I’ve done wrong.’
G
‘Old Laredo. ’ Communicated by Miss Beulah Wohlbeck in 1934, who had it from an uncle, about sixty years old, living in Morgan County. As I rode out in the streets of old Laredo,
As I rode out in Laredo one day,
I saw a young cowboy all wrapped in white linen,
All wrapped in white linen and as cold as the clay.
‘I see by your outfit that you are a cowboy, ’
These words he did say as I boldly stepped by.
‘Come sit down beside me and hear my sad story,
For I’m shot in the breast and I know I must die.
‘Once I was a cowboy and used to go dashing,
Once I was a cowboy and used to go gay;
Went first to hard drinking, then to card playing,
Am shot in the breast and am dying today.
‘Go carry the news to my dear old father,
Go carry the news to my sister so dear,
But there is still one that is still dearer than either
That would be a-weeping if she knew I was here.
‘Go get six cowboys to carry my coffin,
Go get six pretty maidens to carry my pall,
Put bunches of roses all over my coffin,
Put roses to deaden the clouds* as they fall.
‘Go gather around you a crowd of young cowboys
And tell them the story of this my sad fate;
Tell one another before they go farther
To quit their wild roving before it’s too late.
‘Go beat the drum slowly and play the fife lowly,
Go play the dead march as you carry me along,
Go take me to the churchyard and lay the sod o’er me,
For I’m a young cowboy, and I know I’ve done wrong.
‘Go bring me a cup, a cup of cold water
To cool my parched lips,’ the cowboy said.
Before I had turned, the spirit had left him.
And gone to its giver. The cowboy was dead.
We beat the drum slowly and played the fife lowly
And bitterly wept as we carried him along,
For we all loved our comrade so brave, young, and handsome.
For we all loved our comrade although he’d done wrong.
*Miswritten no doubt for ‘clods.’ The English stall ballad is more realistic: And give to each of them bunches of roses,
That they may not smell me as they go along. H
‘The Dying Cowboy.’ From the MS ballad-book of Mrs. John Singleton, of Randolph County, lent to me by her son, Dr. Ralph Singleton, of the Connecticut Experiment Station, in 1938. The entry in the ballad-book was made about 1891. The text does not differ essentially from A.
*Lock Hospital is a special hospital for venereal diseases, located in Harrow Road, London.
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