Lyr Req: Night of the Johnstown Flood

Subject: Lyr Add: LOST IN THE FLOOD (Prentice/Fairbank)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 24 Nov 18 - 08:16 PM

From the sheet music at the University of Wisconsin, Madison:


LOST IN THE FLOOD^[1]
DRIFTING THERE, O, GOD KNOWS WHERE^[2]
Words by Neva Parkhill Prentice, music by H. W. Fairbank. ©1889.
“Commemorative of the Awful Catastrophe at Johnstown, Pa., May 31st, 1889.”

1. Over the brow of the mountain, shadows are falling today,
For the waters are loosed at their fountain, and the death-wave has swept on its way.
There’s a wail of woe where the waters flow and the mother with her babe on her breast
Is drifting there, O, God knows where, drifting down to her death.

CHORUS: O, the sweep of the raging deep, and the cry of the saved on the strand,
For the lost who lie where the waves roll high ‘neath the wreck and the drifting sand.

2. Over the brow of the mountain, madly the wild torrents leap,
And the fierce hungry billows are mounting the banks where the fair hamlets sleep,
And the little child with its brow so mild, and the hero who is sturdy and brave,
They are drifting there, O, God knows where, drifting down to their grave.

3. Over the brow of the mountain, sunlight shall fall as of yore,
And the glad waves shall sing at their fountain, but the lost they shall greet nevermore.
In ev’ry surge there’s a fun’ral dirge for the mother with her babe on her breast
Who is drifting there, O, God knows where, drifting down to her death.

4. Under the tide that is flowing, thousands are lying at rest,
And over them soft breezes sighing as they chant o’er each billowy crest.
They are fast asleep in thy arms, O deep, but a newer light shall shine from thy wave.
They are drifting there, O, God knows where, drifting down to their grave.

- - -
1 Title as given on the sheet music cover.
2 Title as given at the top of page 1 of the sheet music.

Subject: Lyr Add: GONE DOWN THE RIVER (Spencer/Maywood)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 25 Nov 18 - 06:19 PM

From the sheet music in the Levy Collection, Johns Hopkins University:


GONE DOWN THE RIVER
Words by Hubert Spencer, music by George Maywood, ©1889.

1. There’s an album fill’d with pictures that the waters in their rage,
Spar’d to give back to its owner; there’s a group upon one page
With a young and lovely mother, two sweet children by her side,
While the husband and the father on his dear ones looks with pride.
This is all that is remaining of a home that once was bright,
And those little children, where are they whose smile was a delight?
Where is now that tender mother who once watch’d them in their play?
Only one remains, the father, who with choking voice will say:

CHORUS: Gone down the river, gone down the river,
Gone down the river with the fiercely rushing tide.
Those who found their graves ‘mid the wild and cruel waves
Will meet some day at that distant river side.

2. There are shining from the picture smiles that brought delight of yore.
There are those sweet eyes so loving that he never will see more.
There’s the wife’s face fond and trusting that once look’d into his own,
Vanished from his sight forever, gone to leave him here alone.
Children’s eyes once on him smiling, they are clos’d forever now.
Oh, the waste of waters lingers o’er each cold and marble brow.
Hush’d in death are those sweet voices now; in peace each lov’d one sleeps.
“They have all gone down the river,” says the father as he weeps.

3. Oh, the sorrow of that father as he thinks of happy days,
How he lov’d those little children their endearing winning ways!
‘Tis the only link, that picture that can bind him to the past,
And he gazes at it fondly as his tears fall thick and fast.
Never more when home returning will the children voices greet
His oft list’ning ears with “There’s papa,” or hasten him to meet;
And no more each morn with kisses from his dear wife will he part.
They have all gone down the river, leaving but a broken heart.

4. This alas! is one of many who are desolate and lone.
There are hundreds have a sorrow deep as is that father’s own.
In that fair and verdant valley there is scare a home that’s left
Where a family is dwelling that is not by death bereft.
Blessed be that little picture that is all in all to him.
He will gaze upon it often now; his loving eyes grow dim,
For it now is all that’s left him of the days all fill’d with love
Of the ones gone down the river whom at last he’ll meet above.

- - -
The sheet music cover misleadingly seems to identify this song as "THE TORRENTS CAME UPON THEM or the JOHNSTOWN DISASTER" with Words by Tom Hall and music by George Schleiffarth, but the first page of the music makes the actual title clear. "THE TORRENTS...etc." is actually the title of a different song published by the same publisher; see below. An email from a librarian at the Levy Collection clarified this for me.

Subject: Lyr Add: THE AVALANCHE OF DEATH (Hunton/Hiller)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 25 Nov 18 - 07:44 PM

From the sheet music in the Levy Collection, Johns Hopkins University:


THE AVALANCHE OF DEATH or THE JOHNSTOWN HORROR
Words by D. F. Hunton, music by John T Hiler, ©1889.

1. When that lake at Conemaugh
Burst its banks of mud and straw
And came thund’ring down the valley in its wrath,
How the people held their breath
When that avalanche of death
Crush’d out ev’ry town and hamlet in its path!
O, what sorrow and despair
Fill’d the hearts of thousands there,
When they saw their homes swept down the mountain side!
How they trembled when they saw
In the maelstrom’s deadly maw
Men and women struggling vainly in the tide!

CHORUS: Oh, those strain’d and tearful eyes!
O, those frenzied, pleading cries!
How they battled there in vain to reach the shore!
O, the faces pale with fright
That were sinking out of sight!
O, the pray’rs from lips that never pray’d before!

2. When that juggernaut of death
Leapt with unabated breath
Down the valley of that rapid mountain stream,
How it toss’d and tore in shreds
Blocks of buildings, stores and sheds,
And o’er all that desolation reigned supreme!
How those mills and churches grand
Crash’d like eggshells in the hand,
And were thrown like chaff and straw into the flow,
Till the gath’ring shades of night
O’er that weird and ghastly sight
Close in slowly on that awful scene of woe!

3. Oh! that carnival of flame,
When those helpless victims came
Clinging fast to floating wrecks upon the wave!
O, the thousands that were lost
In that midnight holocaust
Where no human had could rescue, none could save!
O, that mother’s wild despair
On the burning wreckage there!
How she strove to save her darling at the breast;
But the red flames at the piers
All unmoved by woman’s tears
Caught and flung them down to perish with the rest.

4. Yet that desolated town
By the deluge trampled down
Will not stop to brood in silence o’er her woe;
For beneath her mud and dust
There are seeds of hope and trust
Which were planted there a hundred years ago.
There are signs in yonder skies
That this mountain queen will rise
Phoenix-like above the ashes of defeat;
That her desolate domain
Will yet bud and bloom again
And her triumph will be certain and complete.

Subject: Lyr Add: THE TORRENTS CAME UPON THEM (Schleiffarth
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 27 Nov 18 - 01:28 PM

I sent a message to the Levy Collection regarding the song whose lyrics I posted earlier, which now appears with its correct title, GONE DOWN THE RIVER, above. A prompt reply from a librarian clarified the situation for me: the publisher had apparently used nearly identical covers for two different songs; furthermore, someone had misread the publication date of one of them (printed in Roman numerals) as 1939 when it was in fact 1889. No doubt the error will be corrected and the page images will be posted here. In the meantime, I have made the following transcription from a PDF that the librarian kindly sent me. Thanks to the Lester S. Levy Sheet Music Collection at Johns Hopkins University.


THE TORRENTS CAME UPON THEM or the JOHNSTOWN DISASTER
Words by Tom Hall, music by George Schleiffarth, ©1889.

1. There was peace within that city; there was plenty ev’rywhere,
In old Johnstown by the Alleghany hills.
There were happy homes unnumber’d; there were firesides free from care.
There was work for honest labor in the mills;
But the torrent came upon them like the thunder from the cloud.
An avalanche of water bore them down.
A fearful cry of terror rose one moment from the crowd,
Then they hushed to burn in agony, or drown!

CHORUS: Hear the piercing cry of horror ‘midst the angry water’s roar.
Hear the wild despairing victims’ awful cry.
‘Twas a mighty freight of sorrow that the foaming waters bore.
God! receive the many thousands doomed to die!

2. A bold hero who was nameless rode the little valley through,
Crying: “Run into the hills; the dam is burst!”
Though his horse was tired and foaming, yet he like an arrow flew,
For the speeding torrent did its very worst.
It caught the horse and rider and all those he tried to save.
It killed them with its icy, chilling breath
And left them in the morning with its wreckage for a grave—
Many thousands who were doomed to awful death!

3. A poor mother clasped her baby one last moment to her breast,
Then was dragged beneath the foam far out of sight.
A fond lover saw his sweetheart drowning helpless with the rest,
And he ran to save her doing all he might;
But the waters in their fury clothed the fearless hero too,
And they held him with his sweetheart as their own.
The heroes they were many and the cowards were but few,
And their sad fate made a mighty nation groan.

4. Then a father saw his loved ones in a moment torn away,
Saw the mother and their children by her side.
With no time to think of rescue and scarce time enough to pray,
He shuddered, wept and then in anguish died.
The children from the schoolhouse they were playing in the street.
A moment and their lessons were all o’er.
Oh! Johnstown’s sad disaster makes the heart with anguish beat.
God protect us from such evils evermore.