Polly Vann- Mrs. Allen (MA) pre1899 Kittredge A
[From G. L. Kittredge, "Ballads and Songs," Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. 30. His notes follow.
R. Matteson 2016]
POLLY VANN (MOLLY WHAN).
Jamieson founded his ballad of "Lord Kenneth and Fair Ellinour" [1] on his recollection of the story of "a silly ditty of a young man, who, returning homeward from shooting with his gun, saw his sweetheart, and shot her for a swan;" and, in circulating "Lord Kenneth" (as a printed sheet) among his friends in 1799, he prefixed a note to that effect, remarking that he had not been able to procure a copy. In 1803 he mentioned the ditty as "the tragic ballad of 'Peggie Baun'" in his list of desiderata in the " Scots Magazine," 65 : 700. In 1806 he was able to publish an incomplete text, "Peggy Baun," in his "Popular Ballads" (1 : 194) from the recitation of a maidservant. He apologized to his readers "for attempting to introduce such paltry stuff to their notice."
A slip issued by Pitts very early in the nineteenth century contains a variant under the style of "Molly Whan" (Harvard College, 25242.4, ii, 67); and almost the same text, similarly entitled, occurs in "The Lover's Harmony" (London, about 1840), p. 158.[2]
J. Andrews (38 Chatham Street, New York) published a text about 1857 in one of his broadsides (List 5, Song 50): "Polly von Luther and Jamie Randall" (Harris Collection, Brown University). Shearin and Coombs, p. 28, describe the ballad (from Kentucky) under the title of "Polly Vaughn."
Barry (JAFL 22: 387) prints a four-stanza medley ("Mollie Bawn" or "At the Setting of the Sun ") which contains four lines of the ballad. The song now in circulation in England, known to collectors as "The Shooting of his Dear," is a disordered form of the broadside. It may be found in Sharp and Marson, "Folk Songs from Somerset," No. 16, 1 :32-33; "Journal of the Folk-Song Society," 2 : 59-60.
A. "Polly Vann." Child MSS., Harvard College Library, ii, 107-108, in the hand of the late Mr. W. W. Newell. "From Mrs. Ellis Allen, West Newton, Mass., born in Scituate, now 89 years old." A similar text is printed in "Family Songs,"[3] compiled by Rosa S. Allen (Medfield, Mass., 1899).
1. "Beware all ye huntsmen who follow the gun,
Beware of the shooting at the setting of the sun,
For I'd my apron about me, and he took me for a swan,
But O and alas! it was I, Polly Vann!"
2. He ran up to her when he found she was dead,
And a fountain of tears for his true love he shed.
3. He took her in his arms, and ran home, crying, "Father,
Dear father, I have shot Polly Vann.
I have shot that fair female in the bloom of her life,
And I always intended to have made her my wife."
4. One night to his chamber Polly Vann did appear,
Crying, "Jamie, dear Jamie, you have nothing to fear,
But stay in your own country till your trial comes on,
You shall never be condemned by the laws of the land."
5. In the heigth of his trial Polly Vann did appear,
Crying, "Uncle, dear uncle, Jamie Randall must be clear,
For I'd my apron about me, and he took me for a swan,
But O and alas! it was I, Polly Vann!"
6. The judges and lawyers stood round in a row,
Polly Vann in the middle, like a fountain of snow.
1 Popular Ballads, I : 193-199.
2 Issued in fifty numbers of eight pages each (" Pitts, Printer").
3 Compare Frank Smith, Dover Farms, pp. 28-29.