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Lynchburg Town
Old-Time, Breakdown, USA, Tennessee (Attributed to Frank Spencer- 1848);
ARTIST: From Our Singing Country, Lomax. Collected from James Mullins, KY 1937;
CATEGORY: Fiddle and Instrumental Tunes DATE: 1848 Minstrel Song
RECORDING INFO: Lynchburg Town- Frank Spencer 1848; American Folk Songs for Children, Doubleday/Zephyr Books, Bk (1948), p.158 (Going Down to Town); American Songbag, Harcourt Brace Jovan..., Sof (1955), P145 (Going Down to Town); Cranberry Lake (Jug Band). Old-Time and Jugband Music, Swallowtail St-8, LP (1977), cut# 11; Ebenezer. Tell It To Me, Biograph RC-6007, LP (1975), cut# 16; Jones, Grandpa. 24 Great Country Songs, King 967, LP (1975), cut#A.05 (Going Down Town); Mainer, Wade. From the Maple on the Hill, Old Homestead OHTRS 4000, LP (1976), cut#D.05; Mainer, Wade; and the Morris Brothers. Good Time Music. National Folk Festival, Philo 1028, LP (1975), cut#A.03; Morse, Peter. Goin' Down to Town, Philips PHM 200-059, LP (196?), cut#A.01 (Going Down to Town); Schilling, Jean. Old Traditions, Traditional JS-5117, LP (196?), cut#A.02 (Who's Going Down to Town); Seeger, Peggy And Mike. American Folk Songs for Children, Rounder 8001/8002/8003, LP (1977), cut# 74 (Going Down to Town); Sexton, Morgan. Shady Grove, June Appal JA 0066C, Cas (1992), cut# 8 (Going Down in Town); Sexton, Morgan. Rock Dust, June Appal JA 0055, LP (1989), cut# 17 (Going Down in Town); Smith, Ralph Lee. Dulcimer; More Old-Time and Traditional Music, Skyline DD-106, LP (1975), cut# 15 (Richmond Town); Staines, Bill. Just Play One Tune More, Folk Legacy C-066, Cas (1986), cut#B.01; Warner, Frank. Our Singing Heritage. Vol III, Elektra EKL-153, LP (1958), cut#A.03;
Lynchburg Town (Tune)- Don't Let Your Deal Go Down; Going Down to Lynchburg Town (tune) Craig, Gray; & The New North Carolina Ramblers. Blue Ridge Barn Dance, County 746, LP (1974), cut# 1; Poole, Charlie; and the Highlanders. Charlie Poole and the Highlanders, 1927-29, Puritan 3002, LP (196?), cut# 7
RELATED TO: “Knocking on the Henhouse Door;” ”Somebody's Tall and Handsome;” “Going Downtown" “Coon Dog," "Raccoon's Tail."
OTHER NAMES: “Going Down To Town;” "Lynchburg;" “I'm Going Down to Lynchburg Town;” “The Old Hat,” “Git Along Down To Town;”
SOURCES: Kuntz (Ragged but Right), 1987; pg. 19-20. Paramount 3171 (78 RPM), 1929, Charlie Poole and the North Carolina Ramblers. Biograph BLP 6005l, "The North Carolina Ramblers." Swallowtail 8, Cranberry Lake- "Old Time and Jug Band Music." Vocalation 5456 (78 RPM), Uncle Jimmy Thompson 1848-1931 (Texas, Tenn.) {1930} [learned by Uncle Jimmy on 8/4/1866, by his account]. Hilltop Records 6022, Uncle Jimmy Thompson. Warner 181, "Lynchburg Town" (2 texts, 1 tune); Sandburg, p. 145, "Goin' Down to Town" (1 text, 1 tune); Lomax-FSNA 260, "Lynchburg Town" (1 text, 1 tune)
NOTES: A Major. Standard. AB. Uncle Jimmy Thompson, the elderly fiddler and "founder of the Grand Old Opry" remembered learning this tune (a "fine quadrille") as a young man in Texas on August 4, 1866 (Wolfe, 1997).
This song/tune is African-American in origin and enjoyed a life on the minstrel stage. Appearing as “The Original Lynchburg Town” by Frank Spencer, the song was published in New York, 1848, by Wm. Vanderbeek. It was popularized by the Christy Minstrels. Here’s a verse and chorus of the original minstrel lyrics:
Verse: You may talk as you will ob de good ole times,
Ob dandy Jim and Joe,
But we am de darkies for fun and glee,
And we sing and play de banjo.
Chorus: And we’re goin’ long down,
And we’re goin’ long down to town
And we’re goin’ long down to Lynchburg town,
To sing to de white folks dar.
The lyrics became part of the folk process until the last line of the chorus became "Toting my tobaccer down," or "To carry my tobacco down, " or "To sell my 'bacca down." An alternate chorus has the “Banjo” line: “To make my banjo sound” or “To lay my banjo down.”
Gwine down to Lynchburg town,
Take my 'baccer (tobacco) down.
(Or the Mississippi version)
I'm going on down to Vicksburg town
To make my banjo sound.
Lynchburg Town is constructed by “floating” verses from many different songs including “Old Joe Clark,” “Cindy” and “Bile Dem Cabbages Down” which are sung usually before each chorus.
As Carl Sandburg said of this song, "This is comic poetry, in a rough and tumble sense, put to a tune that is strictly rough and tumble."....Carl Sandburg (1927) in his "American Songbag," p. 145, under the title "Goin' Down To Town."
The Traditional Ballad Index (cufresno) only traces the Lynchburg town back to 1927, in spite of the fact that it has been reported numerous times by ballad and Negro song collectors. It originated with the minstrels, as so many songs did, and was taken up by both Negroes and whites and made their own. White, N. I., 1928, "American Negro Folk Songs," found it in "Negro Singers' Own Book," ca. 1846, in "A Going Along Down," p. 56, and "Lynchburg Town," p. 157; also in "Ethiopian Serenaders' Own Book," 1857(?) in "Lynchburg Town," p. 80; and in "Christy's Nigga Songster." The song persisted and it was collected in North Carolina from blacks in 1909 and 1915-1916 (I'm gwine down to Richmond town) and in 1925 (Vicksburg town) by Scarborough. (Dicho)
It is doubtful that Frank Spencer is the sole author of Lynchburg Town but he was the first to publish the song in 1848. It was probably learned from one of the many minstrel show performers. Since the title is “The Original Lynchburg Town,” it would seem likely that many other versions were sung in the 1840’s and this was the first “claim” to the popular song.
Here are the lyrics to “Lynchburg Town” from Lomax:
Chorus 1: Going down to town,
I'm going down to town,
Going down to the Lynchburg Town,
To take my tobacco down.
Chorus 2: Times a-getting hard,
Money getting sca'ce,
Pay me for them tobacco, boys,
And I will leave this place.
Massa had an old gray horse,
Took him down to town,
Sold him for a half a dollar
And only a quarter down.
*The old boss had a brand-new coat
And he hung it on the wall,
*Somebody stole old massa's coat
And wore it to the ball.
*The old boss to the sheriff wrote
And sent it by the mail,
Mr. Sheriff got old massa's note
And put the thief in jail.
The old boss had a big brick house,
'Twas sixteen stories high,
And every story in that house
Was full of chicken pie.
The old boss was a rich old man
He was richer than a king
He made me beat the old tin pan
While Sary Jane would sing.
The old boss bought a yaller gal,
He fotch her from the South,
Her hair was wrapped so very tight
That she couldn't shut her mouth.
The old boss had an old black hen,
She laid behind the door,
Every day she laid three eggs
And Sunday she laid more.
The old boss had an old coon dog
And he was a half a hound,
He could run for an hour and a half
And never touch the ground.
Somebody's stole my old coon dog,
I wish they'd bring him back ;
He run the old ones over the fence
And the little ones through the crack.
I went down to town
And went into the store,
And every pretty girl in that town
Came running to the door.
Last time I saw my girl,
She was standing in the door,
Her shoes and stockings in her hand
And her feet all over the floor.
I went down to town
To get me a jug o' wine,
They tied me up to a whipping post'
And give me forty-nine.
I went down to town
To get me a jug of gin,
They tied me up to a whipping post
And give me hell agin.
Note: Chorus 1 and 2 sung before each stanza.
Stanzas sung to tune of either chorus.
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