Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessman)

Subject: Go down, you murderers, go down (Caryl Chessman)
From: GUEST,Miriam
Date: 15 May 05 - 09:37 PM

In summer camp in 1961 and 1962, we sang a song to the tune of "Go Down, You Murderer, Go Down," the song about Tim Evans, only it was "Go Down, You Murderers, Go Down," and it was about Caryl Chessman and other topics. I remember only scattered lyrics, beginning with the second stanza:

For ... he stood his ground,
He stood it like a man;
He said, "I'm innocent of this crime;
My life is in your hands."
Oh, go down, you murderers, go down.

In France they use the guillotine,
In England it's the rope;
For Chessman it was the cyanide pill
That silenced his last hope.

West Virginia miners starve to death
In America today;
If you don't call that murder,
Then you're murderers by trade.

...
That killed six million Jews;
Now they're back with the Western army
And I call that murder too.

If you're rich ...
You can make it or break it too;
But if you're poor you don't stand a devil's chance
Where money is the rule.

***

Can anyone find the complete lyrics, and tell me who wrote it?

TIA.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessma
From: GUEST,Paul Burke
Date: 16 May 05 - 06:29 AM

Here

There seem to be several songs mixed up here. A bit like Mozart, you start whistling one allegro, and a couple of minutes later you notice you've changed seamlessly to a completely different one!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessman)
From: Leadfingers
Date: 16 May 05 - 07:07 AM

Just as a matter of interest , the original 'Go Down,You Murderers' is in the DT with a typo in the title ! Look at 'Go Down,You Murderes'
and there it is ! -Thats the Tim Evans one of course .

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessma
From: Abby Sale
Date: 16 May 05 - 08:34 AM

So what song is Miriam looking for, then?

BTW Paul, the one in the DigTrad has it "right" in the last verse - at least as MacColl sang it:

It was Christie was the murderer, and the judge and jury too,
Saying, "Go down, you murderers, go down!"

Logically, the refrain changes to plural now that other murderers are identified.

MacColl, of course, wrote the song to show Evans was the primary victim. It was a fairly effective anti-death penalty song. It's odd that this, admittedly tiny, change is so often missed (as in the Christy Moore link.)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessman)
From: Mark Ross
Date: 16 May 05 - 10:51 AM

I remember that same version, Miriam! I've been looking for it for 40 years.I was at Camp Wel-Met in upstate New York and I remember one of the counselors singing this to us, I can't remember his name, dammit! But it was to the Ewan MacColl tune with words referring to Chessman. I've seen references to it over the years, but it would be nice to settle the question once and for all.
Any one have an idea as to where to look next?

Mark Ross

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessma
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 16 May 05 - 01:18 PM

I Believe (though I can't be sure) that MacColl wrote the Chessman reworking, too.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessman)
From: GUEST,Miriam
Date: 16 May 05 - 10:16 PM

Nice to hear that, Mark! I was at Camp Woodland in the Catskills.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessman)
From: GUEST,brucie
Date: 16 May 05 - 10:24 PM

I was a counsellor at Camp Webatuck (which changed its name to Camp Abelard after it moved to Hunter, NY).

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessman)
From: GUEST,Miriam
Date: 16 May 05 - 10:56 PM

So after Camp Webatuck changed its name and moved to Hunter, did Vic Fink still run it?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessman)
From: GUEST,brucie
Date: 16 May 05 - 11:01 PM

YES. But we knew the person REALLY running it was Pearl.
Ben Summers kept the maintenance side of things going. Was there for three years and one at Webatuck.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessman)
From: GUEST,Miriam
Date: 16 May 05 - 11:18 PM

Sorry, I didn't know Webatuck very well. I didn't know Pearl or Ben Summers.

So let me see, maybe someone else from Wel-Met or Woodland can help us with the Caryl Chessman song? Or with the Samuel Mabry song (separate thread) unless I REALLY AM the only one who remembers it :(

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessman)
From: GUEST,brucie
Date: 16 May 05 - 11:22 PM

Sing Out! Song Index -- Part One
... Go Down You Murderers .......... v.7#2 ... p.12 .... .... .... MacColl, Ewan.

With the plural in the title, it may be available there.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessma
From: GUEST,Joe Offer
Date: 17 May 05 - 12:04 AM

The Evans version in the (pink) Collected Reprints from Sing Out! is the same as what's in the DT, with one additional verse:

7. The governor came in one day,
The chaplain by his side;
Says, "Your appeal has been turned down,
Prepare yourself to die."
Saying go down, you murderer, go down!

8. So Evans walked in the prison yard....

No information about the version posted in the first message.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Go down, you murderers (Caryl Chessman)
From: GUEST,brucie
Date: 17 May 05 - 12:07 AM

Dang.