Lyr Req: Man from God-Knows-Where (1798 poem)

01 Feb 02 - 02:19 PM (#640140)
Subject: Words to a 1798 Rebellion Poem Required
From: Mayo

In Our Townland on a night Of snow rode a man from god know's were.....

Anybody know the full poem... I heard Phil coulter recite it once.

Many Thanks Mayo

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01 Feb 02 - 02:32 PM (#640145)
Subject: Lyr Add: THE MAN FROM GOD-KNOWS-WHERE (1798 poem)
From: Willa

Man From God-Knows Where , The
Florence M. Wilson

Into our townlan´, on a night of snow,
Rode a man from God-knows-where;
None of us bade him stay or go,
Nor deemed him friend, nor damned him foe.
But we stabled his big roan mare:
For in our townlan´ we´re a decent folk,
And if he didn´t speak, why none of us spoke,
And we sat till the fire burned low.

We´re a civil sort in our wee place,
So we made the circle wide
Round Andy Lemon´s cheerful blaze,
And wished the man his lenth o´days;
And a good end to his ride,
He smiled in under his slouchy hat
Says he: "There´s a bit of a joke in that,
For we ride different ways."

The whiles we smoked we watched him
From his seat fornenst the glow,
I nudged Joe Moore, "You wouldn´t dare
To ask him who he´s for meetin´ there,
And how far he has got to go?"
But Joe wouldn´t dare, nor Wully Scott,
And he took no drink - neither cold nor hot
This man from God-knows-where.

It was closin´ time, an´ late forbye,
When us ones braved the air
I never saw worse (may I live or die)
Than the sleet that night, an´ I says, says I,
"You´ll find he´s for stoppin´ there."
But at screek o´ day, through the gable pane
I watched him spur in the peltin´ rain,
And I juked from his rovin´ eye.

Two winters more, then the Trouble Year,
When the best that a man could feel
Was the pike he kept in hidlin´s near,
Till the blood o´ hate an´ the blood o´ fear
Would be redder nor rust on the steel.
Us ones quet from mindin´ the farms
Let them take what we gave wi´ the weight o´ our arms,
From Saintfield to Kilkeel.

In the time o´ the Hurry, we had no lead
We all of us fought with the rest
An´ if e´er a one shook like a tremblin´ reed
None of us gave neither hint nor heed,
Nor even even´d we´d guessed.
We men of the North had a word to say,
An´ we said it then, in our own dour way,
An´ we spoke as we thought was best.

All Ulster over, the weemen cried
For the stan´in´ crops on the lan´
Many´s the sweetheart an´ many´s the bride
Would liefer ha´ gone till where he died.
An ha´ murned her lone by her man,
But us one weathered the thick of it,
And we used to dandher along, and sit
In Andy´s side by side.

What with discoorse goin´ to and fro,
The night would be wearin´ thin,
Yet never so late when we rose to go
But someone would say: "Do ye min´ thon snow,
An´ the man what came wanderin´ in?
And we be to fall to the talk again,
If by chance he was one o´ them
The man who went like the win´.

Well, ´twas gettin´ on past the heat o´ the year
When I rode to Newtown fair;
I sold as I could (the dealers were near
Only three pounds eight for the Innish steer,
An´ nothin´ at all for the mare!)
But I met McKee in the throng o´ the street
Says he, "The grass has grown under our feet
Since they hanged young Warwick here."

And he told me that Boney had promised help
To a man in Dublin town
Says he, "If ye´ve laid the pike on the shelf,
Ye´d better go home hot-fut by yerself,
An´ once more take it down."
So by Comer road I trotted the gray
And never cut corn until Killyleagh
Stood plain on the risin´ groun´.

For a wheen o´ days we sat waitin´ the word
To rise and go at it like men,
But no French ships sailed into Cloughey Bay,
And we heard the black news on a harvest day
That the cause was lost again;
And Joey and me, and Wully Boy Scott,
We agreed to ourselves we´d as lief as not
Ha´ been found in the thick o´ the slain.

By Downpatrick Gaol I was bound to fare
On a day I´ll remember, feth;
For when I came to the prison square
The people were waitin´ in hundreds there,
An´ you wouldn´t hear stir nor breath!
For the sodgers were standin´, grim an´ tall,
Round a scaffold built there fomenst the wall,
An´ a man stepped out for death!

I was brave an´ near to the edge o´ the throng,
Yet I knowed the face again,
An´ I knowed the set, an´ I knowed the walk
An´ the sound of his strange up-country talk,
For he spoke out right an´ plain.
Then he bowed his head to the swingin´ rope,
While I said, "Please God" to his dying´ hope
And "Amen" to his dying prayer.
That the Wrong would cease and the Right prevail.
For the man that they hanged at Downpatrick Gaol
Was the man from God-knows-where!


ArtistAlbum TitleSong Title

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Posted in duplicate thread:

Subject: RE: Words to a 1798 Poem Required
From: little john cameron
Date: 01-Feb-02 - 02:33 PM

Here ye go.

Florence M. Wilson

Man From God-Knows Where , The Florence M. Wilson

Into our townlan´, on a night of snow,
Rode a man from God-knows-where;
None of us bade him stay or go,
Nor deemed him friend, nor damned him foe.

But we stabled his big roan mare:
For in our townlan´ we´re a decent folk,
And if he didn´t speak, why none of us spoke,
And we sat till the fire burned low.

We´re a civil sort in our wee place,
So we made the circle wide
Round Andy Lemon´s cheerful blaze,
And wished the man his lenth o´days;
And a good end to his ride,
He smiled in under his slouchy hat
Says he: "There´s a bit of a joke in that,
For we ride different ways."

The whiles we smoked we watched him
From his seat fornenst the glow,
I nudged Joe Moore, "You wouldn´t dare
To ask him who he´s for meetin´ there,
And how far he has got to go?"
But Joe wouldn´t dare, nor Wully Scott,
And he took no drink - neither cold nor hot
This man from God-knows-where.

It was closin´ time, an´ late forbye,
When us ones braved the air
I never saw worse (may I live or die)
Than the sleet that night, an´ I says, says I,
"You´ll find he´s for stoppin´ there."
But at screek o´ day, through the gable pane
I watched him spur in the peltin´ rain,
And I juked from his rovin´ eye.

Two winters more, then the Trouble Year,
When the best that a man could feel
Was the pike he kept in hidlin´s near,
Till the blood o´ hate an´ the blood o´ fear

Would be redder nor rust on the steel.
Us ones quet from mindin´ the farms
Let them take what we gave wi´ the weight o´ our arms,
From Saintfield to Kilkeel.

In the time o´ the Hurry, we had no lead
We all of us fought with the rest
An´ if e´er a one shook like a tremblin´ reed
None of us gave neither hint nor heed,
Nor even even´d we´d guessed.
We men of the North had a word to say,
An´ we said it then, in our own dour way,
An´ we spoke as we thought was best.

All Ulster over, the weemen cried
For the stan´in´ crops on the lan´
Many´s the sweetheart an´ many´s the bride
Would liefer ha´ gone till where he died.
An ha´ murned her lone by her man,
But us one weathered the thick of it,
And we used to dandher along, and sit
In Andy´s side by side.

What with discoorse goin´ to and fro,
The night would be wearin´ thin,
Yet never so late when we rose to go
But someone would say: "Do ye min´ thon snow,
An´ the man what came wanderin´ in?
And we be to fall to the talk again,
If by chance he was one o´ them
The man who went like the win´.

Well, ´twas gettin´ on past the heat o´ the year
When I rode to Newtown fair;
I sold as I could (the dealers were near
Only three pounds eight for the Innish steer,
An´ nothin´ at all for the mare!)
But I met McKee in the throng o´ the street
Says he, "The grass has grown under our feet
Since they hanged young Warwick here."

And he told me that Boney had promised help
To a man in Dublin town
Says he, "If ye´ve laid the pike on the shelf,
Ye´d better go home hot-fut by yerself,
An´ once more take it down."
So by Comer road I trotted the gray
And never cut corn until Killyleagh
Stood plain on the risin´ groun´.

For a wheen o´ days we sat waitin´ the word
To rise and go at it like men,
But no French ships sailed into Cloughey Bay,
And we heard the black news on a harvest day
That the cause was lost again;
And Joey and me, and Wully Boy Scott,
We agreed to ourselves we´d as lief as not
Ha´ been found in the thick o´ the slain.

By Downpatrick Gaol I was bound to fare
On a day I´ll remember, feth;
For when I came to the prison square
The people were waitin´ in hundreds there,
An´ you wouldn´t hear stir nor breath!
For the sodgers were standin´, grim an´ tall,
Round a scaffold built there fomenst the wall,
An´ a man stepped out for death!

I was brave an´ near to the edge o´ the throng,

Yet I knowed the face again,
An´ I knowed the set, an´ I knowed the walk
An´ the sound of his strange up-country talk,
For he spoke out right an´ plain.
Then he bowed his head to the swingin´ rope,
While I said, "Please God" to his dying´ hope
And "Amen" to his dying prayer.
That the Wrong would cease and the Right prevail.
For the man that they hanged at Downpatrick Gaol
Was the man from God-knows-where!

ljc

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01 Feb 02 - 02:36 PM (#640151)
Subject: RE: Words to a 1798 Poem Required
From: Willa

Forgot to add details.

Immigrant Songs: Tom Russell, "The Man From God Knows Where" (1999: High Tone Records). ...

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01 Feb 02 - 02:37 PM (#640153)
Subject: RE: Words to a 1798 Poem Required
From: leprechaun

Thank you, Willa.

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12 Oct 04 - 03:36 AM (#1294951)
Subject: RE: Words to a 1798 Poem Required
From: John in Brisbane

'll soon be posting an index to all of the songs where a MIDI exists at the Sing Out website. This is but one example from the Fall 99 Edition with Utah Phillips on the front cover.

In time Mudcat will develop a process to transfer these MIDIs (perhaps with some enhancements) to Mudcat MIDIs.

Regards, John

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13 Oct 04 - 02:08 AM (#1295888)
Subject: RE: Words to a 1798 Poem Required
From: GUEST,JTT

I never realised before how typically Protestant the names in the poem were, reflecting the Presbyterian flavour of the 1798 Rising.

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13 Oct 04 - 11:28 AM (#1296216)
Subject: RE: Words to a 1798 Poem Required
From: Big Tim

Florence Wilson (1874-1946) was a Protestant, a Quaker. Lived in Bangor. All the founding members of the United Irishmen were Protestant (Belfast, October, 1791). However; there were remained many Protestant unionists, the Orange Order being founded in 1795. The rising in the south, which happened first, and separately, was "Catholic", though many Protestant supported it, and lost their lives in it. Many southern Protestants, most probably, opposed it.

The poem has been set to music, at least twice.

1. Five Hand Reel (mainly by Tom Hickland) in 1979, on their "A Bunch of Fives" album.

2. Brian Moore. Not available commericially.

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