Barbara Allen- Starke (VA) 1931 Davis BB*
[From Davis, More Traditional Ballads of Virginia. Davis selected 8 versions out of the 26 new versions collected in Virginia since 1929, Traditional Ballads of Virginia was published. Note that Davis BB* is different from Davis BB from TBVa, 1929. I have not included Davis' extensive notes.
The Brown's Cove area was one of the leading repositories of old ballads in Virginia (see also Sharp, Davis, Wilkinson, Scarborough, Foss etc for other local versions).
R. Matteson 2015]
BB* "Barbara Allen." Phonograph record (aluminum) made by A. K. Davis, Jr. Sung by Mrs. W. F. Starke, of Crozet, Va., Albemarle County. November 11, 1932. Text transcribed by P. C. Worthington. Tune noted by E. C. Mead. Text and tune independently collected by Fred F. Nobloch, April 15, 1931.
'Twas in the merry, merry month of May,
When the green leaf buds were swelling,
Young Jimmy Grove on his death bed lay
For the love of Barbara Allen.
He sent his man unto the town
Where this young maid was dwelling,
Saying, "Haste unto my master dear,
If your name be Barbara Allen,"
Slowly, slowly she got up,
Slowly she came nigh him,
All she said when there she came,
"Young man, I think you're dying."
He turned his face unto the wall,
His back he turned upon her,
While all his friends cried out, "Amen,[1]
Oh cruel Barbara Allen."
She had not gone three miles away
'Fore she heard the death bells nealing.[2]
Every stroke it seemed to say,
"Unworthy Barbara Allen."
She turned her body round about,
She spied the corpse a-coming.
"Lie down, lie down the corpse," she said.
"And let me look upon him."
"Hard-hearted creature him to slight,
When he loved me so dearly.
I wish that I had been kinder to him
When he was alive and near me.
8 "Oh mother, mother, make my bed,
Go make it near and narrow.
My true love has died for me today,
And I shall die for him tomorrow."
9 So they buried them both in the church graveyard
Beneath a rosy bower,
Out of his grave there grew a red rose,
And out of hers a briar.
10 And they grew and they climbed to the church steeple top
Till they could not grow any higher,
There they twined 'to a true lover's knot
For all true lovers to admire.
1. Amain
2. MS. has "tolling," but singer apparently combines "pealing" and "knelling" on the record.