Lyr Add: The Three Hunters

Subject: ADD Version: The Three Butchers
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Sep 07 - 05:58 PM

Randolph collected another version, #77 in Ozark Folksongs and #84 in Randolph-Legman's Roll Me in Your Arms: "Unprintable" Ozark Folksongs and Folklore (Volume 1). Here 'tis:

We Hunted and We Hollered (The Three Butchers)

We hunted and we hollered
And the first thing we did find,
Was an old barn on a hill top,
And that we left behind.

Some said it is a barn,
But the others they said nay,
They said it is a church-house
With the steeple cut away.

We hunted and we hollered,
And the next thing we did find,
Was a hoot-owl in a holler tree
And that we left behind.

Some said it is a hoot-owl,
But the others they said nay,
They said it is the Devil
And we'd better run away.

We hunted and we hollered,
And the next thing we did see,
Was a naked woman in chains,
A-fastened to a tree.

Some said it is a woman,
But the others they said nay,
They said it is a preacher
With his pecker cut away.


Sung by Mr. D.C. Burwell, Joplin, Missouri, Feb 20, 1929
Verses in italics were not included in Ozark Folksongs, but were included in the Randolph-Legman "Unprintable" book.


Note there seems to be no connection to The Three Butchers, looky there...
Could it be that Legman mistitled it?
-Joe-

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: toadfrog
Date: 14 May 01 - 07:34 PM

Hmm. Mike Cohen, are you a composite character? Did you invent toadfrogs? Am I in danger of being sued for copyright infringement? What I had always wondered about that song, is, what is a "norton" Or "Norton," as in:
The Irishman said, it was Norton,
The Scotchman he said nay,
The Welshman said, its the end of the world,
let's go back the other way!

I'd always assumed it was one of those motorcycles used in interplanetary travel, as in "Odds Bodkins."

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: English Jon
Date: 14 May 01 - 08:27 AM

Wood Wilson and Carthy do it as "the St. David's Day Carol" which is a rafficiemento (if that's the right word), made up from various sources, mainly of 3 men went a hunting.

Carthy says it's welsh.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 13 May 01 - 11:42 PM

My goodness- another lost county heard from. Hi Mike.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: Joe Offer
Date: 13 May 01 - 03:33 AM

Hi, Mike - I wondered if that La Jolla marine biologist feller Sam Hinton was the one I heard singing "3 Hunters," but I couldn't find it on his CD.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: GUEST,Mike Cohen
Date: 13 May 01 - 03:02 AM

I was working as a folk song counselor at a very democratic camp in 1953. All decisions were made by group vote. I taught the youngsters Hunted and Hallowed, that I learned from Bill Bonyon and another feller who was a marine biologist down La Jolla, (his name escapes me right now.) Then I asked each group to make up a verse to the song. I remember three.

next thing we did find, was a newly tarred road, and that we left behind. Some said it was a newly tarred road, the other said nay. They said it was Floyd Ireson, with the feather washed away

Some said it was a new verse to this song, but THE MAJORITY SAID NAY And that is why we have, no new verse today.

Some said it was a horse, the others said nay Then the horse said NAY, hell, we all three ran away.

ALSO by way,

It is NCLR, at least it originally was, I was involved in changing it.

Also by the way

It can still be NCLR if you are a member of DAM (Mothers Against Dislexia}

Owls and Howls,

Mike Cohen Shantyboy.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 12 May 01 - 10:55 PM

Joe, I have it by Will Holt on Electra as Three Jovial Huntsman.

Rick

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: toadfrog
Date: 12 May 01 - 10:35 PM

That's right. I should have typed "NLCR." And since it was them, they are undoubtedly following someone else's earlier version. I don't know whose, because I seem to have lost the liner knotes (if any).

Any how, thanks for the kindly advice.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: Joe Offer
Date: 12 May 01 - 08:37 PM

That's what I figured, Dick, a dyslexic version of NLCR. Reminds me of a dyslexic coworker who always messed up phone numbers when he took messages for me - now I find myself doing the same thing.
Something else is bugging my failing memory. This song is DT #315, and a search for #315 turns up a number of songs:

• Three Hunters
• Three Jolly Welshmen
• Three Jolly Welchmen

I know I've heard this song by Cisco Houston or somebody like that, but I can't find it - I think the singer must have used another title. I can hear that "looky there" sung by a baritone voice, but I can't find it. Anybody know of commonly-available recordings of this song, and of alternate song titles?
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 12 May 01 - 07:53 PM

Mos' likely New Lost City Ramblers

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: Joe Offer
Date: 12 May 01 - 07:38 PM

Hi, Toadfrog, what's NCLR?
-Joe Offer-

Subject: THE THREE HUNTERS
From: toadfrog
Date: 12 May 01 - 05:50 PM

The above song is on DT (click), but seems to have no forum references whatsoever. They have left out the very best verse, which goes:

Three men went a- hunting
And something they did find.
They came upon a toad-frog,
And that they left behind!
Well, the Irishman said t'was a toad-frog,
The Scotchman, he said "nay"!
The Welshman said, t'was a jaybird,
With the feathers worn away!

(As sung by NCLR, vol. III.)
I had always understood this to be a Welsh song.