Origin: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o

Subject: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST,Macduff
Date: 09 Oct 01 - 04:11 AM

Does anyone have information on this song? What was it's origin? I heard it sung in Dublin streets many years ago. Or did I? Help

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: MudGuard
Date: 09 Oct 01 - 04:22 AM

See previous thread on this song

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 09 Oct 01 - 01:37 PM

Margaret MacArthur and family recorded this song.. Knowing Margaret, she could probably tell you everything there is to know about the song...

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: Wyrd Sister
Date: 09 Oct 01 - 03:29 PM

Other thread gives game as I remember it. Does anyone know a similar game with the song something like: there came a Duke a-riding, a-riding, a-riding, There came a Duke a-riding something something-ey. Oh will you marry me, sir, etc etc (sorry can't do your line breaks) This may have continued with insult verses, something like "your nose is like a tomato". It was played with two lines facing. On alternate verses, each would move forwards and back. I think there was some kind of capture/chase at the end. This game was imported into our playground from another in the city (Northern UK), hence my haziness.

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: Tig
Date: 09 Oct 01 - 05:46 PM

I've got the words for that one in a songbook of playground games. We played both of them.

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: Snuffy
Date: 09 Oct 01 - 05:56 PM

5 versions in the Digital Tradition database here THREE DUKES , but the one I learned as a kid was more like #4 of the nine versions here THREE DUKES (2).

WassaiL! V

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: okthen
Date: 10 Oct 01 - 04:40 AM

Amusing version at the very end of Kate Rusby's "Little Lights", well it brought a smile to my lips.

bill

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Oct 01 - 05:03 AM

They used that song with kids singing it as a play song in the street in the movie "Girl With the Green Eyes" with Rita Tushingham. That's where I first heard it.

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST,English Jon
Date: 10 Oct 01 - 06:05 AM

One of the first songs I ever learned. My uncle Kieth used to sing it to me when I was very young indeed.

EJ

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: Wyrd Sister
Date: 11 Oct 01 - 03:19 PM

Thanks folks. Neither 'Dukes' link rings strong bells after the first verse. Maybe we made the rest up when no-one could remember it.

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST,Carole
Date: 11 Dec 07 - 09:33 PM

Me and me friends sang this at primary school back in the 50's in the school yard, as did me mam. Was told it was about the Manchester Ship Canal, and being from Manchester, we were dead proud of it at school. We'de make a long line and hold hands and go under the arm of the kid who were chosen, and he or she would put their hand on the wall like it were a bridge on the canal. 'The big ships sail on the Alley Alley O' Can just hear us all now, we had nought, but they were happy uncomplicated days.

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST,iancarterb
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 12:45 AM

Check The Revels site- I first heard it sung by Jack Langstaff at Pinewoods, and I think it and its lineage are included in one of his songbooks.

Subject: RE: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST,Jonny Sunshine
Date: 12 Dec 07 - 07:10 AM

Can't tell you anything about the origins of the song, but it happened every year on the last day of Spetember, unless we were feeling silly, in which case it was the "umpteenth of Octember"

Subject: RE: Origin: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST,Dave
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 09:34 AM

In the mid to late forties we sang "The big ship sails through the Illy Ally Oh, the Illy Ally Oh, the Illy Ally Oh, The big ship sails through the Illy Ally Oh, all on a Sunday morning - I don't remember any more but we sang it in York. Carol Guest's suggestion that it originated in Manchester and refers to the Ship Canal certainly makes sense and could well be the origin. Cheers!

Subject: RE: Origin: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST,kate
Date: 30 Sep 11 - 04:54 AM

We sang the big ship sales though the alley alley O on the last day of September. We sang it in the school play ground in the late fifties/early sixties in the same way as Carol Guest but we held onto the moveable metal netball post! Kate x

Subject: RE: Origin: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST,kate
Date: 30 Sep 11 - 04:55 AM

re. last link, we were in Eccleshall, Staffordshire.

Subject: RE: Origin: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST,Nellie platt
Date: 12 Jul 13 - 01:59 PM

Subject: RE: Origin: Big ship sailing on the alley alley-o
From: GUEST
Date: 21 May 16 - 04:37 AM

We played this at primary school in the late 50s early 60's in Thundersley Essex. The person at the front of the chain would sstand sideways next to a tall fence, near the outside toilets, to make an arch and then everyone else would join hands and troop beneath this bridge.