Bluegrass Messengers

Jolly Sailor- Winters (TN) 1966 Burton/Manning

[From Folklore: Folksongs by Burton and Manning, 1967. This is has an unusual opening and is a hybrid version. I'm not sure if Burton and Manning knew it was a version of Lowlands of Holland.

R. Matteson 2015]

THE JOLLY SAILOR - sung by Mrs. Margaret Winters, 1966.

1. As I went out one May morning down by the river side,
There I espied a lovely fair, oh then to be my bride.
Oh then to be my bride, my boys, and the chambers to behold,
May the heavens above protect my love for a jolly sailor bold.

2. Said the father to the daughter, "What makes you so lament?
There is a lad in our that can make your heart content."
"There is not a lad in our town neither lord nor duke," said she,
"Since the raging winds and stormy seas pared my love and me."

3. "I'll build my love a gallant ship, a ship of noble fame,
With a hundred and twenty sailor boys to box her about the main
To box her about the main, my boys, without a fear or doubt,
In that brave ship my love and I were sadly tossed about.

4. "The cable and the anchor went overboard straightway;
The mainmast and the rigging lay all buried in the sea,
It was tempest and bad weather and the raging of the sea;
I never, never had but one truelove, and he was drowned at sea."

5. "No handkerchief shall bind my head, nor comb go through my hair;
No candlelight nor fireside bright shall view my beauty fair.
And neither shall I married be until the day I die
Since the raging winds and the stormy sea parted my love and I."