Bessie Bell and Mary Gray- Myers (WV) pre1975 Gainer
[From Patrick Gainer's Folk Songs from the West Virginia Hills; 1975-- his short notes follow.
There's nothing traditional sounding about this version which seems to be a recreation by Gainer attributed to Myers.
R. Matteson 2016]
BESSIE BELL AND MARY GRAY
(CHILD 201, "BESSIE BELL AND MARY GRAY")
This sad little ballad tells of two ladies who built a house out in the country to escape from a plague, but the disease was brought to them, and they had to be buried away from the graveyard of their kin. Sung by Ivy Lee MYers.
1. Bessie Bell and Mary Gray,
Lived in a house together
It was not within the city walls,
But out in a filed of heather.
2 And while the plague was raging round,
They thought it would pass them by,
But death soon came in through the door,
These ladies had to die.
3 They could not lie in their own churchyard,
Among their next of kin,
But a grave was dug close by their house
To lay these ladies in.