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Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone

DigiTrad:
DELIA
DELIA (2)
DELIA (4)
DELIA (5)
DELIA, DELIA
DELIA'S GONE


Related threads:
She's all I've got, is gone (8)
(origins) Origin: Delia's Gone (J. Cash version) (29)
Lyr Add: Delia Holmes (3)
Chord Req: DELIA or DEHLIA or DELIA (16)
happy? – Dec 24 (Delia's Gone) (2)
All My Friends are Gone (10)
Chord Req: Delia - bob Dylan (2)
Tune Req: Delia's Gone-music (4)
(origins) Origin: Delia (David Bromberg version) (3) (closed)


GUEST,Phil d'Conch 08 Mar 25 - 12:06 AM
GUEST,Guitarfumbler 06 Mar 25 - 05:11 PM
GUEST,Phil d'Conch 05 Mar 25 - 09:23 PM
Charmion 27 May 20 - 11:35 AM
GUEST,Phil d'Conch 24 May 20 - 03:08 PM
GUEST,Gerry 23 May 20 - 07:29 PM
GUEST,Bob Coltman 23 May 20 - 07:06 PM
Mrrzy 21 May 20 - 10:49 AM
GUEST,Joseph Scott 21 May 20 - 04:16 AM
GUEST,Phil d'Conch 30 Jun 16 - 01:47 AM
Piff 29 Jun 16 - 04:30 PM
Piff 29 Jun 16 - 04:30 PM
GUEST,Phil d'Conch 22 Jun 16 - 06:41 PM
GUEST,Ken Brock 15 Jun 16 - 12:30 PM
Joe Offer 15 Jun 16 - 12:32 AM
Joe Offer 08 Mar 16 - 01:24 AM
GUEST,Phil d'Conch 08 Mar 16 - 12:57 AM
GUEST,Phil d'Conch 08 Mar 16 - 12:50 AM
Leadfingers 02 Jun 10 - 07:11 PM
Mrrzy 02 Jun 10 - 03:27 PM
GUEST,cmt49 12 May 07 - 12:40 PM
GUEST,Guest 12 May 07 - 01:30 AM
GUEST,Q 14 Dec 02 - 08:52 PM
wysiwyg 04 May 01 - 02:29 AM
Rick Fielding 03 May 01 - 10:48 AM
Garry Gillard 03 May 01 - 04:14 AM
GUEST,Roger the skiffler 03 May 01 - 03:40 AM
Rick Fielding 02 May 01 - 06:07 PM
GUEST 28 Mar 01 - 10:56 AM
GUEST,garst@chem.uga.edu 28 Mar 01 - 10:44 AM
GUEST,garst@chem.uga.edu 28 Mar 01 - 10:32 AM
Fortunato 27 Mar 01 - 11:42 AM
Mrrzy 27 Mar 01 - 11:16 AM
GUEST,garst@chem.uga.edu 27 Mar 01 - 11:10 AM
GUEST 27 Mar 01 - 10:24 AM
Whistle Stop 27 Mar 01 - 08:04 AM
Rick Fielding 27 Mar 01 - 12:13 AM
simon-pierre 26 Mar 01 - 05:49 PM
mousethief 26 Mar 01 - 05:31 PM
katlaughing 26 Mar 01 - 05:25 PM
Peter T. 26 Mar 01 - 05:22 PM
GUEST,garst@chem.uga.edu 26 Mar 01 - 03:29 PM
GUEST,Roger the skiffler 03 May 00 - 08:38 AM
Susan of DT 03 May 00 - 07:00 AM
Gypsy 03 May 00 - 01:06 AM
John Hindsill 03 May 00 - 12:46 AM
Gypsy 03 May 00 - 12:36 AM
simon-pierre 02 May 00 - 09:18 PM
simon-pierre 02 May 00 - 09:09 PM
Stewie 02 May 00 - 07:22 PM
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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 08 Mar 25 - 12:06 AM

Ancestry.com: Moses "Coony" Houston (1886-1929)

Mentioned in the John B. thread way back in 2020.:
"...The ever popular “Hoist the John B. Sails,” without which the programme would have been incomplete was the last item on the programme. Needless to say it met with the heartiest applause and as an encore the Orchestra gave “Delia” also a well-known local air set to music by Mr. Prouty....”
[The Nassau Guardian, (NP) 4 April 1903, p.2]

Notes:
Prouty's Orchestra played the winter season at the St. James Hotel, Jacksonville, FL., 1883-1900 before moving to the Hotels Colonial & Royal Victoria, Nassau for seven years. There's sheet music for John B. Nothing so far for Delia.


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Guitarfumbler
Date: 06 Mar 25 - 05:11 PM

I remember hearing Derek Brimstone singing 'Delia' on a live folk club broadcast on Radio 2's 'Folkweave' program back in th mid 1970's. His version was the 'and all the friends I ever had are gone' one.


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 05 Mar 25 - 09:23 PM

Lofthouse/Smith sheet music for the above at YorkU, Toronto:

Delia Gone, One More Roun', Delia Gone
By. L. Charles*
As Sung in
NASSAU, THE BAHAMAS
By picturesque
“SNOW” SMITH

Delia left Tony,
On a Saturday night,
It made him sore and so he swore to shoot her down at sight.

[chorus]
Delia Gone, One More Roun' Delia Gone.
Delia Gone, One More Roun' Delia Gone.
Delia Gone, One More Roun' Delia Gone.
Delia left Tony on a Saturday night.
Delia Gone, One More Roun' Delia Gone.

She came 'round the mountain,
In her “ca-bri-o-lay.”
While he was aiming at the mountain, she got in the way.
[cho.]

The first time he shot her,
She was hit in the side.
The second time his gun went off, she bowed her head and died.

The reason he shot her,
Was because of a curse.
And if he had not shot her down, she might have cursed him worse.

Delilah clipped Samson –
That's what Delia had done.
Now Tony was no Samson but he sure could aim a gun.

Though Tony once loved her,
She went out on the loose.
She vowed she would not cook for Tony, so he cooked her goose.

A two-seat buggy,
Just a broken-down hack –
Took Delia to the graveyard and it never brought her back.

On Monday arrested,
Tuesday – Tony was tried.
The found him guilty, so he also took a one-way ride.”
[Edward B. Marks Music Corporation, 1940]
[Sheet music.]

*Charles Leonard Lofthouse


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: Charmion
Date: 27 May 20 - 11:35 AM

I learned it from Johnny Cash .


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 24 May 20 - 03:08 PM

Could have sworn the Le Gallienne lyric was already in one of the other threads but no, good catch!

Snow Smith & His Bahama Minstrels - Songs of the Bahamas, 1940

Burl Ives didn't record it until 1961 but he picked it up earlier when he worked a bit (as 'Ken McGehen') with Snow Smith.

ART Records (Miami) labelmate George Symonette And His Calypso Sextette covered it two years after Blind Blake.

Belafonte recorded two songs with 'Delia' in the title.

Delia ( "Mark Twain" And Other Folk Favorites, RCA, 1954) is credited to 'Fred Brooks' (aka Fred Hellerman – Weavers) and Lester Judson. Not the same song.

Delia's Gone (Love is a Gentle Thing, RCA, 1959) is credited to Milt Okun and Bob Corman (aka Robert Romero De Cormier, Jr.)

Will Holt's 1957 cover got a lot of attention at the time as well, but for the Yanks it was mostly Belafonte.


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Gerry
Date: 23 May 20 - 07:29 PM

According to the discography in David Dunaway's biography of Pete Seeger, How Can I Keep From Singing, Seeger recorded Delia's Gone in 1950 on We Sing – Vol. 1, on MDH records, a bootleg album recorded live in concert at Reed College. It was also on Pete Seeger Sampler, FA 2043 10-inch, released in 1954 – that's most likely the album Bob Coltman is referring to.


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Bob Coltman
Date: 23 May 20 - 07:06 PM

I believe the first US singer to introduce "Delia's Gone" (by that title) to American folk circles was Pete Seeger on a Folkways 10" LP, album title not remembered, in the early 1950s.

His version uses the Blind Blake refrain (as compared to the several others that use different refrains) but the lyrics are condensed and somewhat different. Whether the divergencies are recomposition by Seeger or are due to some intermediate party I don't know.

The Seeger version was enormously influential at the time. Blake's quite popular Behamian recordings reached the US via tourists, but were much less widely heard.

Bob


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 May 20 - 10:49 AM

I learned this from Harry Belafonte's Mark Twain album, the one with Man Piaba, which I just found in mp3 format yay.


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Joseph Scott
Date: 21 May 20 - 04:16 AM

_Pieces Of Eight_ by Richard Le Gallienne, 1918 includes
“Some gave a nickel, some gave a dime
I never gave no red cent, she was no girl of mine
Delia gone! Delia gone!”

https://pictures.abebooks.com/MBHR/22385404827.jpg


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 30 Jun 16 - 01:47 AM

Eric's father, Leon Bibb, covered Delia in 1960 (Leon Bibb Sings Love Songs, VRS 9073, trk. A7, with John Stauber on guitar.)


Mudcat thread: Help: Tell me about Leon Bibb

(He passed in October, 2015. Thought there was an obit thread too but no luck finding it.)


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: Piff
Date: 29 Jun 16 - 04:30 PM

There is a very attractive and poignant - if somewhat abbreviated - version of the song on Eric Bibb's album "Painting Signs" (which is a great album, by the way!)


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: Piff
Date: 29 Jun 16 - 04:30 PM

There is a very attractive and poignant - if somewhat abbreviated - version of the song on Eric Bibb's album "Painting Signs" (which is a great album, by the way!)


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 22 Jun 16 - 06:41 PM

Artist Alice Pashley's c.1929 version, another by-product of the Peas an' Rice thread:

Rubber tyred buggy, double-seated hack,
Carry poor Delia to de graveyard and never bring her back.
Delia gone, Delia gone.

Parson in de pulpit, telling all dem lies;
Ebry time a funral pass he roll dem goo-goo eyes,
Delia gone, Delia gone.

Parson in de pulpit, trying to save his soul,
his wife is at de corner selling jelly roll,
Delia gone, Delia gone.


Ackknowledgement
The six songs with music were taken down by Mrs. Alice Pashley.
[Defries, Amelia, The Fortunate Islands, (London: Cecil Palmer, 1929, p.xxi)]


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia / Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Ken Brock
Date: 15 Jun 16 - 12:30 PM

One reason some folks above had trouble finding Delia's Gone in the Kingston Trio database is that they titled their version "One More Round".


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Jun 16 - 12:32 AM

There's a nice recording of "Delia Gone" here:It's from the Lomax Deep River of Song collection. The album is titled Bahamas 1935.

-Joe-


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia
From: Joe Offer
Date: 08 Mar 16 - 01:24 AM

Phil, for a number of reasons, please do not post the same message or the same set of lyrics in two different threads. Pick the one more appropriate thread, and post your lyrics there.
As multiple threads on songs continue to increase, I have been combining threads, including the most pertinent information and the most distinctive versions in "origins" threads.
Thanks.
-Joe Offer, Mudcat Music Editor (and registrar, if you'd like to join)-
joe@mudcat.org


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Subject: RE: Origin: Delia's Gone (J. Cash version)
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 08 Mar 16 - 12:57 AM

Part II

Delia's Gone
Words and Music by
BLAKE ALPHONSO HIGGS (BLIND BLAKE)

1.
Now Delia cursed Tony
'Twas on one Saturday night.
And she cursed him such a wicked curse,
That he swear to take her life.
Delia's gone one more round, Delia's gone.

2.
First time Tony shot Delia
He shot her right in her side.
The second time he shot her,
She gave up the ghost and died.
Delia's gone one more round, Delia's gone.

3.
The reason why Tony shot Delia
Because she cursed him a wicked curse
And if Tony had'nt shot lil Delia,
She might have cursed him worse.
Delia's gone one more round, Delia's gone.

4.
Now Delia's friend is in prison
Drinking out the silver cup
Whilest Delia she lying in the grave
Fighting her level best to get up.

Delia's gone, etc.

5.
On monday Tony was arrested,
On Tuesday his case was tried,
The juryman brought him down guilty,
He began to rollin' his goo-goo eyes.

6.
A rubber tire buggy
A double seated hack
Took little Delia to the graveyard
And they never brought her back.

7.
I went down to the graveyard
Just to look in my Delia's face.
I said, "Delia girl, you know I love you,
But I just couldn't take your place."

8.
"Jailor, Oh Jailor!"
Tony said, "How can I sleep
When all around my bed-side
I can hear little Delia's feet?"

9.
The man that shot my Delia
He was riding on a wheel,
He rode that wheel so mighty fast
They think it was an automobile.

10.
Some give Delia a nickle,
Some give Delia a dime,
I didn't give her one red cent
Because she wasn't a gal of mine.

11.
Sixty-four years in prison
Tony told the judge that isn't no time,
He said my younger brother's in the penitentiary
Servin' nine hundred ninety and nine.

© Copyright 1952 and 1954 Hollis Music, Inc., New York, N.Y.

Patterson, Massie, Heyward, Sammy (eds), Calypso Folk Sing, (NY: Ludlow Music, 1963) pp.26-27
©1963 Ludlow Music, New York, N.Y.
First released on: ART Records, ALP6, 10"LP, AEP6, 2x7"EP gatefold, 1952 (recorded in Nassau.)

(Same as mentioned elsewhere with copyrights, dates &c.)


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Subject: RE: Origin: Delia's Gone (J. Cash version)
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 08 Mar 16 - 12:50 AM

We have a couple of "Delia" threads going. Following up on my last and posting these wherever the Bahamian branch of the tree gets mention. My Gilbert-Lofthouse sheet music is still MIA. More to follow… hopefully.

Delia Gone

Tony shot his Delia, on a Christmas night,
First time he shot her she bowed her head and died–
Delia gone–one more round Delia-gone –
Delia gone–one more round Delia gone.

Send for the doctor, doctor came too late,
Send for the minister to lay out Delia straight.
        Delia gone, one more round! Delia gone.

Delia's mudder dressed herself in brown,
Went to the cemetery to see her daughter layed down.
        Delia gone, one more round! Delia gone.

Rubber tired buggy, double-seated hack,
Take my Delia to de graveyard an' never brought her back.
        Delia gone, one more round! Delia gone.

Tony axed the jailer, "What is my time?"
"Sixty-four years in ------- -------'s mine."
        Delia gone, one more round! Delia gone.

Sixty-four years, that ain't no time!
Old Joe Bagstack is servin' ninety an' nine!
        Delia gone, one more round! Delia gone.

All you gamblers that likes to bet,
Come down to de courthouse and witness Delia's death.
        Delia gone, one more round! Delia gone.


No doubt this popular tho' tragic ballad has its basis in some episode of Nassau history now forgotten. There is, however, a faint resemblance in theme to a song that originated in St. Louis called "Frankie and Johnnie."

"Thomas Beer, in his 'Mauve Decade,' places this ballad as early as 1850, but Emerson Hough dates it fully ten years ealier." –
Read 'Em and Weep. One stanza is particularly reminiscent:

                "O bring your rubber-tired hearses;
                        O bring your rubber-tired hacks.
                They're takin' your Johnnie to the buryin'ground
                        And they won't bring a bit of him back."



McCutcheon, John & Evelyn, The Island Song Book, (Chicago Tribune Tower, private printing, Jan. 15, 1927) p.11

Note:
History has not been kind to Thomas Beer and justly so. When did rubber-tired buggies, hearses, hacks and whatevers come to your neck of the planet?


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia
From: Leadfingers
Date: 02 Jun 10 - 07:11 PM

The first time Tony shot Delia she began to roll her eyes
The next time he shot poor elia she lay right down and died

As performed by Acker Bilk and his Paramount Jazz band cerdited to Blind Blake


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Jun 10 - 03:27 PM

If delia died after the first shot, why did they need one more round?


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia
From: GUEST,cmt49
Date: 12 May 07 - 12:40 PM

Thanks for the history. Delia was the first country blues number I ever learned. Can't remember where. Funnily enough, I have always sung the culprit's name as 'Curly'. So it's really 'Coony'? I love hearing historical evidence for oral tradition stories like this.


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Subject: RE: Origins: Delia
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 12 May 07 - 01:30 AM

I'm not sure if this string is still active, but I must thank Mr. Garst for the information posted here! I've been researching my name --- yes, it's Delia -- and was thrilled to see this. My father and brother used to tease me with their own versions of this song when I was very young. They would have a great laugh once they could get me angry enough to go stomping out of the room. I always thought they had just made up the whole "Delia's Gone" concept. I guess the laugh is on me! I'm not gone! I'm still here alive and kicking! :-)


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Subject: RE: Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 14 Dec 02 - 08:52 PM

DELIE (Delia's Gone)

Delie, Delie, was a-goin' her last round,
When ole coon came by
An' shot her to the groun'.
All I done had done gone.

Delie, Delie, why didn't yo' run,
When yo' seen dat coon a-comin'
Wid his forty-fo' caliber gun?
All I done had done gone.

Rubber-tired cayage, rubber-tired hack
Done took poor Delie to de bone yard,
Ain't never brought her back.
All I done had done gone.

Men in Atalanta tryin' to pass fo' white,
Delie's in de bone yard
Six foot out o' sight.
All I done had done gone.

Men in Atalanta drinkin' out a silver cup,
Delie's in de bone yard,
Ain't never goin' to get up.
All I done had done gone.

"Reported from Durham, NC, 1924, MS. of M. L. Hamlin, 'from memory of a song taught Frank Goodell of Spartenburg, SC, ... by an old Negro to whom he paid $1.00 to teach him to play the guitar. Learned probably between 1900 and 1904'." Newman L. White, "American Negro Folk Songs, 1925 (and reprints), Folklore Associates, p. 215-216. Connected to Frankie and Albert, but here the woman is shot by the man, instead of vice versa.
The following fragment collected 1915-1916, MS. of E. L. Harper, heard in Alabama, "Sung by Negro to guitar." Also from Newman L. White, p. 216.

Delia! Delia! raise up your head,
Try and take your medicine just like the doctor said.
Poor gal, she gone! Poor gal, she gone!


In DT: Delia, Delia(2), Delia's Gone.

Also compare with "Lilly," thread 48696: Lilly
Also has the line, "All I got's done gone." The woman shoots Pauly.


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Subject: RE: Delia's Gone
From: wysiwyg
Date: 04 May 01 - 02:29 AM

Way too much fun!


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Subject: RE: Delia's Gone
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 03 May 01 - 10:48 AM

Harvey here, Ta aer kid, we've 'ad a bostin'time. Back fer the Bonks's ternight!!

Harvey Andrews


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Subject: RE: Delia's Gone
From: Garry Gillard
Date: 03 May 01 - 04:14 AM

Lal Waterson refers to this song and its effect in/on .

Garry Gillard


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Subject: RE: Delia's Gone
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 03 May 01 - 03:40 AM

Thanks for that, Rick, tell Harvey I hope he's having a BOSTIN' time: he'll know what thet means!
Best wishes
RtS


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Subject: RE: Delia's Gone
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 02 May 01 - 06:07 PM

Hi Roger. I'm sitting here with distinguished Songwriter Harvey Andrews befor he and his good lady Wendy wend their weary way back to the pleasures of Gnosall Staffs. Harvey was the person who told me that he actually SAW Blind Blake at the Airport in the Bahamas, pickin' and singing for the touristas. I was bloody THRILLED! I remember that Sing=Out used to print a lot of his songs.

Hope all is well.

May your cordwangler not get caught in the mangler.

Rick (and Harvey)


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 10:56 AM

Alex (mousethief) wrote:

>Interesting. Al Stewart recorded a song called >"Delia's Gone" which appears to be totally >unrelated to this one. Lyrics here: blicky

The lyrics below are found at the Al Stewart site Alex points to.

>... >Delia's gone like a darkening of the sky >A change in the weather >Delia's gone like a moment out of time >Maybe forever >Lines of coffee cups on parade >Soldiers for keeping the night away >Soon, too soon, you'll be moving out >There's nothing here to hold you now >Delia's gone.

>Delia left Tony >On a hot summer night >She would not go for him and so >He shot her down at sight >Delia gone, one more round, Delia gone!

I'm puzzled here by the last verse, which doesn't scan like the others and which really belongs to the old Delia ballad. How did it get here? When I listened to Al Stewart's recording, it wasn't there. It looks like a mistake at the Al Stewart lyrics website. Further, the lines "She would not go for him and so He shot her down at sight" are unusual, but they are found in the Best Bluegrass Songbook - Ever! mentioned in my last post.


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: GUEST,garst@chem.uga.edu
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 10:44 AM

Another tidbit:

When Mose Houston given a sentence of a lifetime of hard labor in the state penitentiary, he stood up and thanked the judge. He meant it, obviously - the alternative was a death penalty. Even so, the newspapers though it unusual to thank the judge for a life sentence, and they made "THANKED THE JUDGE" the headline of their report.

I am aware of only one version of the ballad that mentions this, and it is a most unusual one that has almost nothing in common with other versions. It appears in an unusual publication, too, a 1970s songbook called The Best Bluegrass Songbook - Ever! by Arthur Bayas and Lipton Nemser. If it weren't for the fact that the last verse is about thanking the judge, a historical fact that is missing in other versions, I would have consigned this version to the trash, thinking that the compilers had written it.

Does anyone have a clue where the compilers might have gotten their version? Anybody ever heard of Arthur Bayas or Lipton Nemser? (This sound to me like they could be phony names.)


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: GUEST,garst@chem.uga.edu
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 10:32 AM

Other tidbits:

Mose Houston wore long pants the night he shot Delia, but he wore short pants to court. When asked why he said that the long ones were being cleaned. Clearly, though, his lawyer, Raiford Falligant, wanted to emphasize his youth.

Willie West said that there were about a half dozen people at the Christmas Eve party, that they were gathered around an organ singing hymns, and that there had been no drinking. Another witness placed the number present at about 40 and said that most of them were drunk.

Falligant called a witness who said that he knew something about the "character" of the house where Willie West lived. Unfortunately, his testimony was not allowed, so I don't know what it would have been. Years later, when Falligant was trying to get Mose Houston out on parole, he described it as a "rough" house.


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: Fortunato
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 11:42 AM

Great work.

Congratulations.

fortunato


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 11:16 AM

This is, again, why I love the Mudcat so. Here is a song I've always known and never thought to wonder about the history, and here it is, in all its fascinating glory. Thanks!


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: GUEST,garst@chem.uga.edu
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 11:10 AM

>So Somewhere along the line Cooney became Cutty? I have never heard a version that called Delia's murderer by any other name.

Well, it's often "Tony." I think that Blind Willie McTell actually sings "Cuhnny" and that "Cutty" is an attempt to make some sense of that name.

John Garst


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: GUEST
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 10:24 AM

So Somewhere along the line Cooney became Cutty? I have never heard a version that called Delia's murderer by any other name.


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 08:04 AM

Great info -- thanks for sharing. I've known this song for years, but until today had no idea of its origins. Fascinating stuff.


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 27 Mar 01 - 12:13 AM

Once again (I already did it in "Ella Speed") Bravo!

Rick


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: simon-pierre
Date: 26 Mar 01 - 05:49 PM

Related thread

Other thread

These threads includes comments and lyrics of different versions of the song.


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: mousethief
Date: 26 Mar 01 - 05:31 PM

Interesting. Al Stewart recorded a song called "Delia's Gone" which appears to be totally unrelated to this one. Lyrics here: blicky

Alex


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: katlaughing
Date: 26 Mar 01 - 05:25 PM

Just like the other thread on Ella Speed, this is wonderful. Thanks, so much.

kat


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Subject: RE: Delia
From: Peter T.
Date: 26 Mar 01 - 05:22 PM

Thank you John. As a sometime researcher myself, it must have been a great moment when you found the source. You sort of want to go up to the nearest stranger and say, look, look, and of course they have no idea what it is you are going on about.

yours, Peter T.


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Subject: Delia
From: GUEST,garst@chem.uga.edu
Date: 26 Mar 01 - 03:29 PM

"Delia" gained national prominence as "Delia's Gone" after the Bahaman Blind Blake (Blake Alphonso Higgs) recorded it in the 1950s. Almost every pop group of the "great folk scare" recorded it. Further, it crossed over into country and rock. Johnny Cash recorded it twice, once in about 1960 and once in 1993. Bob Dylan recorded it in 1992. In field recordings, it goes well back into the '20s and '30s, and it was recorded by jazz band leader Jimmy Gordon at that time. In published collections, you find versions in the collections of Odum and Johnson (1925 and earlier) and White (1928). It is no doubt older, dating to about 1900. White's informant said he learned it between 1900 and 1904.

As far as I know right now, the tag "Delia's" (or "Delia") "gone, one more round, Delia's gone" was strictly Caribbean before its introduction to the U.S. in the 1950s. Earlier in the U.S., the tag lines were "One more rounder gone," "All I done had done gone," "Poor gal, she gone," "She's dead, she's dead and gone," "All the friends I ever had are gone," etc.

John Cowley pointed out to me that Robert Winslow Gordon had reported to the Library of Congress in 1928 that he had tracked the "Cooney Killed Delia" song to its source in Yamacraw, a black neighborhood of Savannah, GA (see Good Friends and Bad Enemies, by Debora Kodish). Gordon never published anything on this, and I have no idea where his papers on this subject might be. It appears that the Library of Congress doesn't have them (from what they tell me), but I haven't yet been there or to the University of Oregon, where there are more Gordon papers, to check things out personally. Gordon said that he had interviewed and photographed Delia's mother and the detective that had investigated the case and that he had collected 28 different versions of the song and copied 50 pages of court records. I've not seen any of this, unless some of the court records I've found (fewer pages) overlap with Gordon's.

John Cowley suggested that, living in Georgia, I might be in a position to track Delia down again, so I started casually looking at versions in accessible sources. When I found the lines, "Nineteen hundred, Nineteen hundred and one, Death of po' Delia, Has jes' now begun," I went immediately to the library to scan the year 1901 in Savannah newspapers on microfilm. Two hours later, in mid-March, 1901, I was looking at an article stating that Moses Houston would go on trial tomorrow for the murder of Delia Green last Christmas Eve. I found other articles, one of them calling Moses "'Coony' Houston," and later the clemency file of Moses Houston in the Georgia State Archives. That file contains a summary, nearly a verbatim transcript, of testimony at Moses' trail. By the way, "Houston" is pronounced "howss'tun" in south Georgia, not "hews'tun."

Delia, age 14, was working as a scrub girl in the home of Willie West, on Harrison Street, across the street from Delia's home with her mother at 113 Ann Street. About four months earlier, Delia and Moses, also 14 but nearly 15, had started seeing one another. At the party late Christmas Eve night, around 10:30-11:00 or so, they were quarreling. Cooney appears to have been teasing Delia, claiming that she was his "wife," and talking about their sexual relationship. Delia replied that he was a lying son-of-a-bitch and that she was a lady. Willie West threatened to kick Cooney out of the house if he didn't behave. After that, there was no more fussing, but as the party was breaking up, and as Cooney was leaving, he took a 0.39-cal pistol and shot Delia in the left groin area. Willie West chased him out into the street and held him while police were called. Cooney said that he shot Delia because she called him a son of a bitch, and that he would do it again under the same conditions, but he offered to pay for Delia's doctor. Delia was taken across the street to her mother's house, where she was attended by a doctor, perhaps the same one that signed her death certificate, J. W. Ward. The doctor told newspaper reporters that she would not live, and at around 3 a.m. Christmas morning, 1900, Delia died. According to her death certificate, she was buring in Laurel Grove Cemetery, Savannah, but a recent inventory of tombstones in that cemetery does not contain a record of a marker for Delia Green.

Mose, as he came to be called in later life, was convicted of murder with a recommendation for mercy, due to his youth. He was sentenced to life at hard labor in the state penitentiary. He was probably eligible for parole after 7 years, but he served 13. He was paroled in 1913 by Governor John Marshall Slaton, the same governor whose commutation of Leo Frank's death sentence in the Mary Phagan case was followed by Frank's lynching by a mob and an end to Slaton's political career.

I know nothing of Mose's later life. I would like to find living relatives of Mose Houston and Delia Green, but so far I have not tracked any down.

John Garst


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Subject: RE: Lyr/Chords Req: Delia
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 03 May 00 - 08:38 AM

I've just checked the KT home page and this isn't one of the 280 songs on it. Still worth a visit.
http://home.att.net/~kingstontrioplace/lyricsaf.htm
RtS


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Subject: RE: Lyr/Chords Req: Delia
From: Susan of DT
Date: 03 May 00 - 07:00 AM

Bugsy - the line break is [br], not [b] (with pointy brackets). I fixed it up. I am sorting thru these Delias versus the ones already in the DT to see what is new to add.


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Subject: RE: Lyr/Chords Req: Delia
From: Gypsy
Date: 03 May 00 - 01:06 AM

My hero!!!! That is exactly what i was looking for. Don't know how you figured out the song from my scanty description, but i truly appreciate.


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Subject: Lyr Add: DELIA (Fred Brooks, Lester Judson)
From: John Hindsill
Date: 03 May 00 - 12:46 AM

The song that Gypsy is looking for is "Delia" credited to Fred Brooks & Lester Judson. It is on RCA Victor LPM-1022, " 'Mark Twain' and Other Folk Favorites", 1954 [and one of the first LPs I bought]. This is, perhaps, Belafonte's first album, at least of folk music.

Delia, Delia, where have you been so long?
Delia, Delia, everything I had is gone.
The trees have left the countryside,
The frost is on the ground,
The birds all sing a different song,
With a low and a lonesome song.
With a low and a lonesome sound.

Delia, Delia, where have you been so long?
Delia, Delia, everything I had is gone.
If we could count the falling stars,
As we have done before,
Or share the sound of summer rain,
I'd never ask for more.
I'd never ask for more.

Who can tell where Delia's gone,
Or why she went away,
Or if she always knew that she,
Would break my heart one day?
Would break my heart one day?
Delia, Delia aah,
Delia.
^^


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Subject: RE: Lyr/Chords Req: Delia
From: Gypsy
Date: 03 May 00 - 12:36 AM

I'm afraid that the version that I am looking for must be even more obscure. tis a love song, one of the few lines that i can recall is "the wind has a lonesome sound, a lost, lonesome sound" Mayhap i have the name wrong? Thanks to all for the help!


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Subject: RE: Lyr/Chords Req: Delia
From: simon-pierre
Date: 02 May 00 - 09:18 PM

I should do my research before posting... Rockaday Johny said on the other thread dedicated to this song last year: «The Delia's Gone version that Dylan covered (All my Friends have gone) is from Steffan Grossman who, in the 60's combined the McTell version with the Gary Davis Version.»

Could somebody do a blue clicky thing to this informative thread?

SP


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Subject: Lyr Add: DELIA (from Bob Dylan)
From: simon-pierre
Date: 02 May 00 - 09:09 PM

Dylan has made something very closed to the version posted by stewie.

DELIA

Delia was a gambling girl, gambled all around,
Delia was a gambling girl, she laid her money down
All the friends I ever had are gone

Delia's dear old mother took a trip out west
When she returned, little Delia gone to rest
All the friends I ever had are gone

Delia's daddy weeped, Delia's momma moaned
Wouldn't have been so bad if the poor girl died at home
All the firends I ever had are gone

Curtis' looking high, Curtis' looking low
He shot poor Delia down with a cruel fourty-four
All the friends I ever had are gone

High up on the housetop, high as I can see
Looking for them rounders, looking out for me
All the friends I ever had are gone

Men in Atlanta, tryin' to pass for white
Delia's in the graveyard, boys, six feet out of sight
All the friends I ever had are gone

Judge says to Curtis, "What's this noise about?»
"All about the rounders, judge, tryin' to cut me out"
All the friends I ever had are gone

Curtis said to the judge, "What might be my fine?"
Judge says, "poor boy, you got ninety-nine"
All the friends I ever had are gone

Curtis' in the jailhouse, drinking' from an old tin cup
Delia's in the graveyard boys, she ain't getting up
All the friends I ever had are gone

Delia, oh Delia, how can it be?
You loved all them rounders, never did loved me
All the friends I ever had are gone

Delia, oh Delia, how could it be?
You wanted all them rounders, never had time for me
All the friends I ever had are gone
^^^

In the booklet of «World gone wrong», Dylan wrote: «Delia is one sad tale - two or more versions mixed into one. The song has no middle range, come whipping around the corner, seems to be about counterfeit loyalty. Delia herself, noo Queen Gertrude, Elizabeth 1 or even Evita Peron, doesn't ride a Harley Davidson across the desert highway, doesn't need a blood change & would never go on a shopping spree. the guy in the courthouse sounds like a pimp in primary colors. he's no interessed in mosque on the temple mount, armageddon or world war 111, doesn't put his face in his knees & weep & wears no dunce hat, makes no apology & is doomed to obscurity. does this song have rectitude? you bet. toleration to the unacceptable leads to the last round up.»

SP


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Subject: RE: Lyr/Chords Req: Delia
From: Stewie
Date: 02 May 00 - 07:22 PM

Here are the lyrics of Blind Willie McTell's version from a Library of Congress recording. I got them from Harry's blues lyrics online site. I have a very different version somewhere, but I can't remember where.

DELIA

Delia, Delia, how can it be?
You love that old rounder but you don't love me
Well, that's one more rounder gone
Delia, Delia sitting all around
Some of your old rounders gonna pay my way back home
Sitting on the housetop, high as I can see
You love that old rounder, but you don't love me

Delia's poor mother took a trip out West
When she returned, Delia lyin' in rest
Delia's mother wept, Delia's father moaned
They'd have wanted their poor child to die at home
Rubber tired buggy, two-seated hack,
Took Delia to the graveyard, never brought her back

Kenny lookin' high, Kenny lookin' low,
Shot poor Delia with that hated .44
Delia, Delia, wouldn't take no one's advice
Last words I heard her say were, "Jesus Christ!"
Judge said to Kenny, "Here's a natural fact:
you going to wait in jail till Delia come back"

Kenny's in the basement, drinking from a silver cup
Delia's in the graveyard, never come back up
Kenny said to judge, "What's the fuss about?
Just that no good woman trying to put me out"
^^

In his 'American Folk Poetry', Duncan Emrich includes a very long version under the title 'Delia Holmes' from the singing of Will Winn of Columbia, South Carolina. He also gives a reference to an article in the December 1937 edition of Southern Folklore Quarterly: Chapman J. Milling 'Delia Holmes - A Neglected Negro Ballad'.

--Stewie.


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