Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)

Subject: Lyr Add: OLIVER CROMWELL LAY BURIED AND DEAD
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 29 Oct 06 - 02:34 PM

The following I posted in another thread, before realising that a search at the 'Cat did not turn it up.
Sources on the Net suggest an origin as a nursery rhyme at least back to the 17th century:
He is even memorialized musically: a folk song bearing his name was edited by Benjamin Britten in 1938. A nursery rhyme that can be first traced back to the late seventeenth century begins "Oliver Cromwell lay buried and dead, hee-haw, buried and dead."
From: This Site
The words quoted below are taken from the BBC 'Time & Tune' Schools broadcast booklet for Spring 1955, with the addition of a last verse from memory.


OLIVER CROMWELL LAY BURIED AND DEAD
(Trad)

Oliver Cromwell lay buried and dead,
Hee-haw, buried and dead,
There grew an old apple tree over his head,
Hee-haw, over his head.

The apples were ripe and ready to fall,
Hee-haw, ready to fall,
There came an old woman to gather them all,
Hee-haw, gather them all.

Oliver rose and he gave her a drop,
Hee-haw, gave her a drop,
Which made the old woman go hippety hop,
Hee-haw, hippety hop.

The saddle and bridle, they lie on the shelf,
Hee-haw, lie on the shelf,
If you want any more your can sing it yourself,
Hee-haw, sing it yourself.


CHEERS
Nigel

Subject: Tune Add: OLIVER CROMWELL
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 29 Oct 06 - 02:41 PM

Bear with me, this is a first attempt at ABC. Although it looks straightforward I wouldn't mind someone checking on me.
Again the music is from the BBC's "Time & Tune" series. Had I done it from memory (whilst also getting to grips with ABC) I would have rendered the second (shorter) 'd' in the eighth bar as a lower 'D'
And, yes, with the exception of the eighth/sixteenth bars, the second half is a straight repeat.

CHEERS
Nigel

X:1
T:Oliver Cromwell
M:3/4
L:1/4
K:D

ddd|AAA|FGA|D3|
d3|A3|FGA|D2d|
ddd|AAA|FGA|D3|
d3|A3|FGA|D3|]

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: MartinRyan
Date: 29 Oct 06 - 04:49 PM

A corner of my mind says "Old Roger (Poor Toby?)is dead and low in his grave.." in a similar structure.

Regards

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 29 Oct 06 - 04:59 PM

The text quoted is originally from Lucy E Broadwood and J A Fuller Maitland, English County Songs (London: Leadenhall Press, 1893, 94-5). Your memory of the final part is very close (it was "must" rather than "can").

Miss Broadwood had learned the song "from a Suffolk boy" many years (as she put it) previously (Journal of the Folk-Song Society, V, (20), 1916, 295-6). Forms of it have turned up all over the place; mostly in England and the USA, but also in Scotland and Ireland. It has a range of names, but 'Old Roger', or variations thereon, seems most common. An example from Carmel O Boyle, Cut the Loaf: Irish Children's Songs (Mercier Press, 1986) is quoted in a thread from 2001:  ADD: Poor Roger

The song-group is number 797 in the  Roud Folk Song Index,  where references to many examples may be found. Worth mentioning here are three recordings from American tradition that are available online:

At  California Gold:  Old Crumpy

At the  John Quincy Wolf Folklore Collection:  Old Grumble is Dead

At  Voices from the Dust Bowl:  Old Humpy He Died and He Rose Again

Whether there's any real connection with Cromwell I don't know (nor whether the song can reasonably be traced as as back as the 17th century), though the question has probably been addressed a number of times over the years. The Opies don't include it in The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes, but it features in The Singing Game; I'd expect the background information there will be as good as you will find.

Subject: Lyr Add: OLD ROGER
From: Snuffy
Date: 29 Oct 06 - 07:20 PM

It looks like a cut down version of the Old Roger that I learned at school in the 50s, almost the same as the Irish version Malcolm mentions above:

Old Roger is dead and he lies in his grave
Lies in his grave, lies in his grave
Old Roger is dead and he lies in his grave
E, O lies in his grave
[not sure about the E O, could have been hee-haw or some other nonsense syllables]

They planted an apple tree over his head, etc

The apples grew ripe and they all fell down ...

There came an old woman a-picking them up ....

Old Roger got up and he gave her a (knock?}...

Which made the old woman go hippety hop ...

I don't think my version had the "lie on the shelf"/"sing it yourself" bit

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 29 Oct 06 - 08:10 PM

Thanks to Malcolm, Martin & Snuffy. I added it purely because I couldn't find it here, and Cromwell was being discussed "below the line"
I'm happy to accept corrections/information from those better informed. At least I've started the discussion

Anyone checked the ABC? (I can scan and send the BBC page if anyone wants it! PM me if so)

CHEERS
Nigel

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 29 Oct 06 - 09:16 PM

Did you learn it formally, or from other children? It was taught as a singing game in (UK) schools as late as the 1950s and '60s (see thread  'Singing Together' 1958 UK ); perhaps from versions published by Alice Gomme and/or Cecil Sharp.

Incidentally, another version, 'Sir Roger is Dead' was printed in the Journal (ref above) with actions indicated; it was noted at Worksworth (Wirksworth), Derbyshire.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 29 Oct 06 - 09:34 PM

The question was directed at Snuffy, of course. The abc works, but the Time and Tune set doubles Broadwood's note durations, and the tune is transposed up a tone.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: Snuffy
Date: 30 Oct 06 - 08:25 AM

We learned it in the classroom (juniors), and as far as I recall actually performed it as a little play/sketch in a "review" type production for parents, governors, etc.

Subject: Lyr Add: OLD CRUMMY
From: GUEST,Mary Lovell
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 12:50 PM

Our family has a "song" which reminds me of the versions on this board. It has been passed through the generations since the 1700's in Ashe Co. North Carolina. My grandmother said it was a song, but the tune had been lost prior to 1910 with our branch of the family in Southern Indiana. Her father recited it, making it almost a ghost story, instead of a children's game song.


Old Crummy's dead and laid in his grave
Um Hm laid in his grave

An apple tree grows over his head
Um Hm grows over his head

The apples begin to drap
Um Hm begin to drap

An old woman comes picking em up
Um Hm comes picking em up

Old Crummy raised and give her a knock
Um Hm give her a knock

The horse is on the laurel hill, bridle and saddle on the shelf

If you want any more you must sing it yourself

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: Goose Gander
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 01:17 PM

Thank you for sharing that, Mary Lovell.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: Flash Company
Date: 21 Apr 07 - 07:43 AM

I'm sure I should know something similar to this! The line about making the old woman go hippity hop feels very familiar, but I can't dredge it up.

FC

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Jul 13 - 03:15 AM

My 95 year old mother keeps singing this rhyme

Oliver Cromwell went to France
To teach the ladies how to dance,
and this is what he taught them,
Left right,left right,
A left, a left,
Left right, left right.

Does anyone else know it?

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: Airymouse
Date: 09 Jul 13 - 07:28 PM

Also available on the internet is Nellie Galt's Mulberry Hill. Nellie is a wonderful counterexample to the idea popularized in The Song Catcher that old songs are known only to the poor and uneducated.
http://www.loc.gov/folklife/Gordon/sideBbandB5.htm
My family had more of a family bush than a family tree , but my half-sister's half sister's mother sang a version called "Old Crump's Dead". I haven't been able to find this version in print or on the internet, but I am waiting to hear back from an expert mudcatter about this and several other old songs that I have not been able to track down.

Subject: Lyr Add: OLD ROGER IS DEAD (children's game)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 15 Jul 13 - 11:40 PM

From an article, "Old Berkshire School-Games," by Emma Elizabeth Thoyts, in The Antiquary, Vol. 27 (London: Elliot Stock, June, 1893), page 255:

Game 17.—Old Roger.

This is another great favourite among the games. The ring is formed round a child who lies upon the ground, while another waits outside the magic circle until it is her turn to join the game.

Old Roger is dead
And lies in his grave—
    Heigho! lies in his grave!

There grows a great apple-tree
Over his head—
    Heigho! over his head!

The wind it do blow,
And the apples do fall—
    Heigho! the apples do fall!

There came an old woman
A-picking them up—
    Heigho! a-picking them up!

Old Roger got up,
And he gave her a knock—
    Heigho! gave her a knock!

And the old woman
Went off hibble de hop—
    Heigho! hibble de hop!

Subject: Lyr Add: OLD GRUMBLER + SIR ROGER + OLD CRUMP
From: GUEST,airymouse
Date: 05 Jul 14 - 12:39 PM

Available on the internet or in print are

1) Old Grumbler is dead and he's
under the ground (3)
Old grumbler is dead and he's under the ground
Way high up

2) Sir Roger is dead and he's laid in his grave
laid in his in his grave(3)
Sir Roger is dead and he's laid in his grave
E I
laid in his grave

Here is old crump's dead. By the way, the woman who sang it to me did not know that a crump is a hunchback.

Old crump's dead and in her grave
um um
in her grave
Up sprang an apple tree over her head
um um
over her head
Apples were ripe and ready to fall
um um
ready to fall
'long came an old man to gather them all
um um
gather them all
Up jumped ol crump and gave him a knock
um um gave him a knock
The way he went was hippety hop
um um hippety hop
Bridles and saddles are up on the shelf
um um up on the shelf
You want any more you can sing it for yourself
um um sing it yourself.

This is the only version of the apple tree song in which the person picking up the apples is a man

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: GUEST,Stim
Date: 05 Jul 14 - 03:18 PM

"Old Crump" was a real, and particularly colorful person associated with Cromwell--this from ancestry.com:

First you must meet John "Crump" Dutton, grandson of Thomas Dutton the
first owner of the Sherborne estate. John "Crump" was a hunchback, engaging,gregarious, wealthy, hard living, colorful, with a passion for gambling! A favorite legend tells of a card game in which Crump wagered Sherborne itself! Fortunately a faithful butler heard the cry "Sherborne is up!" and was able to restrain Crump's folly by lifting him bodily out of his chair and carrying him out of the room! During England's Civil War, 'Crump'contrived to be on both sides at the same time! At one point he offered to lend Charles I 50,000 pounds! By the end of the Civil War he had re-established friendly relations with Oliver Cromwell and even attempted to arrange a marriage between his nephew and heir with Cromwell's daughter!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: GUEST,airymouse
Date: 05 Jul 14 - 10:43 PM

Thank you, guest Stim, for this amazing piece of information. I had no idea there was a connection between Old Crump and Oliver Cromwell!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: GUEST
Date: 01 May 15 - 05:59 PM

The lyrics as I learned them growing up in different parts of the American West in the 1950s:

Old Grumble is dead and lays under the hill
Under the hill
Under the hill

Old Grumble is dead and lays under the hill
Under the hill
Way down low.

[then the part about the apple tree and the old lady picking up the apples.]

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 02 May 15 - 04:15 AM

Could this have been political propaganda about Cromwell's and Crump's (evil) ideas still being fruitful? The old woman symbolizing some political entity at the time of the lyricist?

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: GUEST,Sue
Date: 19 Feb 17 - 03:44 PM

I suspect the rhyme might be an allusion to Oliver Cromwell's body having been exhumed and hanged as a traitor by Royalists immediately after the restoration of the monarchy. "Old Oliver rose" - i.e. was dug up - and "the drop" is a slang term for hanging.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: mg
Date: 20 Feb 17 - 10:37 PM

there is a connection between roger williams, founder of rhode island, and cromwell. i am descended from brother of roger williams and the one name i did not want to find was cromwell. but there are cromwells higher up in the tree. there was supposedly this wierd thing where cromwells ran out of sons and had some williams take the name of cromwell i think. disgusting all the way around.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 21 Feb 17 - 10:26 AM

There was supposedly this wierd thing where cromwells ran out of sons and had some williams take the name of cromwell i think. disgusting all the way around.
Or some later Cromwells who didn't want to be associated with the name, so claimed a different heritage, and that the name had been foisted upon them?

Subject: Lyr Add: OLD CRUMMIE
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Sep 18 - 09:38 PM

This is a "song" which we were taught by our Grandmother, Edra Lucille (Millis) Thoman born 1905. She said she remembers being held on her father's lap while he said this song (she does not remember hearing it sung, did not know the tune it was sung to.)

OLD CRUMMIE

Old Crummie's dead and laid in his grave.
Ummhmm, laid in his grave.

An apple tree growed over his head.
Ummhmm, growed over his head.

The apples they begin to drap.
Ummhmm, begin to drap.

Old Curmmie's wife come pickin em up.
Ummhmm, come pickin em up.

Old Crummie raised and give her a knock.
Ummhmm, give her a knock.

An away she went hippity-hop.
Ummhmm, hippity-hop.

The horse is on the laurel hill, bridle and saddle under the shelf,
If you want any more, sing it your self!

Sung by Zack Burton born (Born 1801 Ashe, North Carolina) in 1855 Lawrence Co, Indiana

If we could say "again please" before the line sing it your self the poem would be repeated by another adult which was a source of great fun for all!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Oliver Cromwell (Buried & dead)
From: GUEST,Julia L
Date: 19 Jan 23 - 10:50 PM

I've just found this version in the Helen Hartness Flanders collection
sung in 1948 by Mrs. Charles Benjamin of Washington DC who learned it as a child in Oakland Maine.

1) Old Father Crummett (Oliver Cromwell) went down to Whitehall
Hmmm, Hah, down to Whitehall
And there he fell sick amongst them all
To me high-down, ho-down, hmmm, hah!

2) Old Father Crummett (Oliver Cromwell) was laid in his grave
The Devil came after him before he was dead

3) Out of his grave there grew a great tree
And it bore the worst apples that ever you'll see

4) Before they were ripe and fit for a fall
There came an old woman who gathered them all

5) Her dress it was red and her petticoat green
She was the worst lookin' critter that ever was seen

One can easily see that "Father Crummett" is a mondegreen for "Oliver Cromwell". The references to Whitehall (Cromwell's residence), that he fell sick while there (Cromwell died of complications of malaria and kidney disease shortly after moving there), the Devil coming after him etc corroborate the association with Cromwell esp when you read this poem made by one contemporary William Douglas, a Scot

Poem on the Death of Oliver Cromwell by Will Douglas (English Royalist poet in the 17th century)

Cromwell is dead, and risen; and dead again,
And risen the third time after he was slain
No wonder! For he’s messenger of Hell:
And now he buffets us, now posts to tell
What’s past; and for one more game new counsel takes
Of his good friend the Devil, who keeps the stakes.

So, not a nursery rhyme, but a political statement, as many "nursery rhymes" were originally. (As mentioned before, Cromwell's body was exhumed and "executed" publicly for political purposes. His severed head was displayed in a pike for about 20 years till it fell off an was kept as a souvenir by an enterprising fellow who charged money to view it.

I'm intrigued by the apple tree and the inedible apples, presumably his sons, and the "old woman" in the red dress with a green petticoat. Both known as symbols of socially outcast individuals if not outright
denizens of the otherworld.

Any ideas regarding these?

Anyway, I'm presuming it came to Maine/New England with the Scottish prisoners of war sent here during that era.