Monthly Archives: October 2023

31 Oct

The Storm at Sea

Cease rude Boreas blust’ring railer, list ye landsmen all to me,
Messmates hear a brother sailor, sing the dangers of the sea,
From bounding billows first in motion, when the distant whirlwinds rise,
To the tempest-troubled ocean, where the seas contend with skies.

Hark the boson hoarsely bawling, by top sailyards and halyards stand,
Down top gallants quick be hauling, man the top sail hand boys hand,
Now it freshens, set the braces, now the top sail sheets let go,
Luff boys luff don’t make wry faces, up the top sail nimbly clew.

Lovers who on down beds sporting, fondly locked in beauty’s arms,
Fresh enjoyments wonton courting, free from all but love’s alarms,
Round us roars the tempest louder, think what fear each mind appalls,
Harder yet it yet blows harder, now again the boson calls.

The top sail yards point to the wind boys, see all clear to reef each course,
Let the fore sail go, don’t mind boys, though the weather may prove worse,
Fore and aft the main sail sprit set, reef the mizzen see all clear,
Up and each preventer brace get, man the fore sail cheer lads cheer.

Now the dreadful thunder roaring, peal on peal continual crash,
On our heads fierce rainfall pouring, in our eyes blue lightning flash,
One wide water all around us, all above us one black sky,
Different deaths at once surround us, hark what means that dreadful cry?

“The fore mast’s gone” cries every tongue out, o’er our lee twelve feet ’bove deck,
A leak beneath the chest tree’s sprung out, call all hands to clear the wreck,
Quick the land yards cut in pieces, come, my hearts, be stout and bold,
Plum the well the leak increases, four foot water in the hold.

While o’er the ship wild waves are beating, we for wives and children mourn,
Alas, from hence there is no retreating, alas to them there is no return,
Still the leak is gaining on us, both chain pumps are choked below,
Heav’n have mercy here upon us! Only that can save us now.

O’er the lee beam lies the land boys, let the guns o’er board be thrown,
To the pumps come every hand, boys, see our mizzen mast is gone.
The leak we’ve found she cannot poor fast, we’ve lightened her a foot or more,
Up and rig a jury fore mast, she rights she rights, boys we’re off shore,

Now once more on joys we’re thinkin’, since kind fortune spared our lives,
Come the can boys lets be drinkin’, to our sweethearts and our wives.
Fill her up a bout ship wheel it, close to the lips a brimmer join,
Where’s the tempest now who feels it? Now our dangers drown in wine.

This month’s song comes from the repertoire of Reuben Waitstell Phillips (1850-1926) who sent its text to the “Old Songs That Men Have Sung” column of Adventure Magazine in March, 1924. “Old Songs” editor Robert Winslow Gordon later visited Phillips at his home in Chamberlain, Minnesota with his wax cylinder recording machine that same year but no recording of Phillips singing “The Storm at Sea” seems to have survived.

I found the above melody on a recording made in 1939 of singer John Campbell in Underhill, Vermont that is part of the (now digitized) Flanders Ballad Collection. Underhill is just east of Lake Champlain. Phillips grew up in Hopkinton, New York some 70 miles west of that lake. The text above is Phillips’ with many spelling edits (I also filled in the last half of the 7th verse using the Roundelay book mentioned below).

Most of Phillips’ songs are traceable to early 19th or 18th century balladry from England or Scotland that came to New England. “The Storm at Sea” fits this pattern. It appeared in several printed sources in England and Scotland in the 1800s. The song likely originated in the 1700s. For an early printing of the text that some scholars date to the 1780s, see page 125 of the digitized version of the book Roundelay or the New Syren on Google Books.

31 Oct

Driving Saw Logs on the Plover

There walked on Plover’s shady banks one evening last July,
A mother of a shanty-boy, and doleful was her cry,
Saying, “God be with you, Johnnie, although you’re far away,
Driving saw-logs on the Plover, and you’ll never get your pay.

“Oh, Johnnie, I gave you schooling, I gave you a trade likewise.
You need not been a shanty-boy had you taken my advice.
You need not gone from your dear home to the forest far away,
Driving saw-logs on the Plover, and you’ll never get your pay.

“Why didn’t you stay upon the farm and feed the ducks and hens,
And drive the pigs and sheep each night and put them in their pens?
Far better for you to help your dad to cut his corn and hay,
Than to drive saw-logs on the Plover, and you’ll never get your pay.”

A log canoe came floating a-down the quiet stream.
As peacefully it glided as some young lover’s dream.
A youth crept out upon the bank and thus to her did say,
“Dear mother, I have jumped the game and I haven’t got my pay.

“The boys called me a sucker and a son-of-a-gun to boot.
I said to myself, O Johnnie, it is time for you to scoot.’
I stole a canoe and I started upon my weary way,
And now I have got home again — but nary a cent of pay.”

Now all young men take this advice: If e’er you wish to roam,
Be sure and kiss your mothers before you leave your home.
You had better work upon a farm for a half a dollar a day,
Than to drive saw-logs on the Plover, and you’ll never get your pay.

This month we have a rare instance of an old traditional song where we know the identity of its composer. “Driving Saw-Logs on the Plover” was written in 1873 by William Allen of Wausau, Wisconsin. William Bartlett, a local historian in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, knew Allen personally and connected him with song collector Franz Rickaby in the early 1920s. Thanks to notes and documents saved by Bartlett and Rickaby we know a lot about Allen, who put some of his songs out under the pseudonym “Shan T. Boy.”

Allen was born in 1843 in St. Stephen, New Brunswick just across the river from Calais, Maine. His parents were both immigrants from Ireland. The family moved to the western shores of Lake Michigan in 1855 where they lived first in Cedar River, Michigan in the Upper Peninsula and then Manitowoc, Wisconsin before heading inland to Wausau. After apprenticing with a timber cruiser near Green Bay, Allen returned to Wausau in 1868 (age 25) to begin a long career as a cruiser himself. Cruisers would roam the woods estimating the quantity and quality of trees for harvesting.

Allen’s work as a cruiser provided a context for singing and song writing. In a letter to Bartlett, he wrote “I had occasion to visit a great many logging camps in the course of each winter, and it was customary for me to sing for the lumber-jacks in lumber-jack style… …Several of my poems are sarcastic descriptions of characters and failings of our respectable (?) citizens, and I have been threatened with libel suits and shot-guns on several occasions.” “Driving Saw-Logs on the Plover” does not name any particular crooked boss but it certainly paints a grim picture of a shanty boy who, after enduring the labor and danger of a log drive, realizes his employer has no intention of paying him.

Allen based the song text and melody on a popular broadside ballad called “The Crimean War” or “As I Rode Down Through Irishtown” (see Northwoods Songs #10). It is a well worn melody in the Irish tradition. Ontario singer Bob McMahon had a nice twist on it when he sang it for Edith Fowke in 1959. I have blended McMahon’s melody with the melody and text given by Allen to Rickaby here.

31 Oct

Young Monroe

Come all you jolly shanty boys, wherever you may be,
I hope you’ll pay attention and listen unto me,
Concerning a young shanty boy so manfully and brave,
It was on a jam at Garray’s rocks where he met with a watery grave.

It was on a Sunday morning as you will quickly hear,
Our logs were piling mountain high, we could not keep them clear,
When the boss he cries, “Turn out, me boys, with hearts devoid of fear,
To break the jam on Garry’s rocks and for Eagantown we’ll steer.”

Some of them were willing, while others they hung back,
To work upon a Sunday they did not think was right,
Until six of our young Canadians they volunteered to go,
And break the jam on Garry’s rocks with their foreman, young Munroe.

They had not rolled off many logs when the boss to them did say,
“I would have you to be on your guard, for this jam will soon give way.”
Those words were scarcely spoken when the jam did break and go,
And carried away those six young men with their foreman, young Munroe.

When the rest of those young shanty boys they came, the news to hear,
In search of their dead bodies for the river they did steer,
When one of their lifeless bodies found to their sad grief and woe,
All cut and mangled on the rocks was the form of young Munroe.

They took him from his watery grave, combed down his coal-black hair,
There was one fair form among them whose cries did rend the air;
There was one fair form among them, a girl from Saginaw town,
Her tears and cries would rend the skies for her lover that was drowned.

Miss Clara was a noble girl, likewise a raftsman’s friend,
Her mother was a widow living by the river’s bend,
The wages of her own true love the boss to her did pay,
And a liberal subscription she received from the shanty boys next day.

They took and buried him decently, being on the tenth of May,
And the rest of you young shanty boys, it’s for your comrade pray!
It is engraved on a little hemlock tree, close by his head it does grow,
The day and date of the drowning of this hero, young Munroe.

Miss Clara did not survive long to her sad grief and woe;
It was less than two weeks after she, too, was called to go,
It was less than two weeks after she, too, was called to go,
And her last request was granted her, to be laid by young Munroe.

Now, any of you shanty boys that would like to go and see,
On a little mound by the river side there grows a hemlock tree;
The shanty boy cuts the woods all round, two lovers here lie low,
Here lies Miss Clara Dennison and her lover, young Munroe.

This month marks the 100-year anniversary of Irish-Minnesotan singer Michael Cassius Dean sending a copy of his song book, The Flying Cloud, to song collector Robert Winslow Gordon. Accompanied by a brief note on a postcard featuring Virginia, Minnesota’s 10-year-old high school building, this parcel led to one of the earliest audio recordings of traditional music in Minnesota. Twelve months later, inspired by this collection of 166 songs from Dean’s repertoire, Gordon went in search of Dean with his wax cylinder recording machine in tow.

Dean’s version of “Young Monroe” was one of the songs recorded by Gordon in September 1924 and the above transcription is my own made from the Gordon recording. The full text above comes from Dean’s book.

“Young Monroe,” often titled “The Jam at Gerry’s Rocks,” was one of the most widely sung come-all-ye type songs about logging work. Versions were collected all over the US and Canada. For a nice recording, check out this one of Ted Ashlaw. Ashlaw lived in a similar part of northern New York to where Dean grew up and his melody, though similar to Dean’s, has some nice twists to it.