O Jailer- Mitchell (NC) 1918 Sharp H
[My title. Single stanza from English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians; 1932. Collected by Cecil J. Sharp (1859-1924) and Olive Dame Campbell. Edited by Maud Karpeles. Their notes follow.
R. Matteson 2015]
Notes: No. 24. The Maid Freed from the Gallows.
Texts without tunes:—Child, No. 95.
Texts with tunes:—English County Songs, p. 112. Folk Songs from Somerset, No. 121.
Journal of the Folk-Song Society, v., 228. American variants:—American Journal of Folk-Lore, xxi., 56; xxvi., 175. Musical
Quarterly, January, 1916, pp. 10 and 11 (without tunes). Wyman and Brockway's
Lonesome Tunes, p. 44.
Sharp diary 1918 page 258. Thursday 12 September 1918 - Burnsville, North Carolina
Have a very bad night, asthma etc and wake up feeling very seedy with bad neuralgia in my right eye. Still very cold indeed. Go out prospecting after first calling on Mrs Cheseborough whom we met 2 years ago at the Knoxville conference. She received us very cordially and asked us to lunch with her tomorrow at 12.30. Then we draw Bowley’s Creek but I am too tired to go far and beyond getting some clues we get nothing. After tea we move upstairs to two very pleasant rooms and then go up Mitchell Branch. Call on Mrs Hannah Mitchell who did sing but has forgotten her songs and then at her advice go on to her daughter Mrs Effie Mitchell from whom we get half a dozen rather good ones. After dinner when sitting on the verandah, Dr Patterson, prof[essor] of physics at N[orth] C[arolina] University introduces me and asks me to come & talk with the Governor of N[orth] C[arolina] — Mr J. W. Bickett, who had a copy of my Putnam book and showed a good deal of interest in my work. Sat talking with him & Patterson — who is in attendance upon him — till bed- time. Find them both very interesting. Go to bed with a very bad headache & feeling woefully seedy. A heavy thunderstorm in the evening.
H. [O jailor] The Maid Freed from the Gallows. Sung by MRS. EFFIE MITCHELL at Burnsville, N. C, Sept. 12, 1918
Hexatonic (no 6th).
O jailor, won't you slack that rope?
Pray slack it for awhile,
I think I see my own mother
'bout one hundred miles.