Butcher's Boy- Sam Hinton (TX) 1966 REC
[No source informant or location named. From FOLKWAYS RECORDS Album No. FA 2401; 1966 Folkways Records and Service Corp., 17 W. 60th St., NYC. THE WANDERING FOLK SONG By SAM HINTON. His notes follow,
R. Matteson 2017]
The Butcher's Boy-- When a song has become firmly established in the oral tradition, it is very likely to produce "floating stanzas" which wander about, ready to attach themselves to any song that seems to need another verse or two. "The Butcher's Boy," which probably dates back to the early 1600's, has produced a whole rash of these floating stanzas, of which the most widespread are the "Dig my grave both Wide and deep" lines.
The Butcher's Boy- As sung by Sam Hinton, originally from Texas, in 1966.
In Jersey City where I did dwell,
A butcher's boy I loved so well.
He courted me both night and day,
But now with me he will not stay.
There is an inn in this same town,
There my love he sits- him down,
Takes some strange girl upon his knee,
And tells her what he won't tell me.
Oh, is this not grief to me,
That she has silver more than me?
But her gold will fade and her silver fly,
And someday she'll be poor as I
She went upstairs and to her bed,
Nothing to her mother said.
And when her father he came home,
He said "Where has my daughter gone?
He went upstairs, the door he broke,
Found her hanging by a rope.
He took his knife and cut her down,
And in her bosom these words he found.
"Go dig my grave both wide and deep,
With marble slab at head and feet;
On my breast a turtle dove,
To show the world that I died for love. "