Sixteen Come Sunday- J. Orchard (Dev) c.1975 REC
[My date. From VT151CD "Holsworthy Fair" 'Songs, Tunes and Stepdances from a Devon Gypsy family’ Tom, Jean and Ashley Orchard. Song notes by John Howson follow. Cf. Charlotte Renals on VT119CD ‘Catch me if you Can’.
R. Matteson 2018]
Another song Jean learned from Granny Dehlia. Often the girl is coming on seventeen but in North America Sixteen Come Sunday was popular and even Bob Dylan used the theme for his song Blackjack Davey. In England Seventeen Come Sunday was in many traditional singers’ repertoires and it turns up all over the country probably because it was printed by several Victorian broadsheet printers including Catnach and Such in London. Cecil Sharp noted it down twenty-two times during his collecting activities at the beginning of the twentieth century. Another fine version on Veteran can be heard sung by Cornish traveller Charlotte Renals on VT119CD ‘Catch me if you Can’.
Tom, Jean and Ashley Orchard come from true Gypsy stock and they now live at Holsworthy, north Devon where Tom runs a roofing business. They have a strong family tradition of singing, stepdancing and making music and members of the family including Jean’s mother Amy Birch and Tom were recorded in the 1970s and some of those recordings appeared on Topic and Folkways LPs.
Sixteen Come Sunday- sung by Jean Orchard of Holsworthy, Devon, in the 1970s.
Where are you going my fair pretty maid?
Where are you going my honey?
She answered me yes quite cheerfully
On an errand for my mammy
With my rue dum a day for the diddle ey right for the laura lido
May I come too my fair pretty maid?
May I come too my honey?
She answered me yes quite cheerfully
You may for me and welcome
With my rue dum a day for the diddle ey right for the laura lido
Now she was tall and her clothes were smart
And her hair hanged down in ringlets
Her eyes were blue and her shoes were black
And her buckles shone like silver
With my rue dum a day for the diddle ey right for the laura lido
How old are you my fair pretty maid?
How old are you my honey?
She answered me quite cheerfully
I’ll be sixteen come next Sunday
With my rue dum a day for the diddle ey right for the laura lido
What is your father my fair pretty maid?
What may he be my honey?
She answered me yes quite cheerfully
My father he’s a farmer
With my rue dum a day for the diddle ey right for the laura lido
Will you marry me my fair pretty maid?
Will you marry me my honey?
She answered me yes quite cheerfully
I’ll have to ask my mammy
With my rue dum a day for the diddle ey right for the laura lido
Now if I do down to your mammy’s house
When the moon is shinning clearly
Will you come down and let me in?
For your mammy she won’t hear me
With my rue dum a day for the diddle ey right for the laura lido
So he goes down to her mammy’s house
When the moon was shinning clearly
And she comes down and lets him in
And he laid in her arms till morning
With my rue dum a day for the diddle ey right for the laura lido