The Little Schoolboy- Hobart Smith (VA) 1942 Lomax
[Sometimes titled The Two Brothers, "The Little Schoolboy" was recorded by Alan Lomax in 1942 (I have the recording but I can't find the liner notes). The 1942 was date of the first sessions Lomax recorded with Hobart Smith (b. 1897) who is Texas Gladden's younger brother. Hobart's version is nearly identical to Texas Gladden's version titled, Jessel Town (collected in 1932 for Arthur K. Davis)- it's missing two on the end verses. According to Davis the Gladden's text was collected independently by Mrs. Peel in 1917 (this is a bit unclear since Davis does not name Gladden as the earlier informant).
Cf. Jessel Town- Texas Gladden 1917 (VA) Davis BB. Notes on Smith by Mike Yates follow.
R. Matteson 2014]
Hobart was from Saltville in the bottom left-hand corner of Virginia, close to the borders with North Carolina and Tennessee. He was born May 10, 1897, and first worked in farming and waggoning. Later he was a house-painter. For one twelve year period he worked as a butcher. But, for most of his life, he was a musician, playing for local dances, providing music for outdoor baptisms and indoor church services, and, like Wade Ward and Uncle Charlie Higgins, playing at land auctions. Around 1915 he worked in minstrel shows. By then he was playing the fiddle and had been playing the banjo for at least eleven years.
Hobart and his sister, the ballad singer Texas Gladden, first came to the notice of the outside world while attending the White Top Music Festivals, which ran from 1931 to 1939. White Top was the brainchild of the composer John Powell and Annabel Morris Buchanan and seems to have been conceived to counter the commercializing effects that record companies and radio stations were making on mountain music.
The Little Schoolboy
[Listen: Hobart Smith- The Little Schoolboy]
O brother, O brother can you play ball, or roll the marble stone?
No brother, no brother, I can’t play ball, nor roll the marble stone,
No brother, no brother, I can’t play ball, nor roll the marble stone.
He took his *tommy-hawk from his side, he hacked him across the breast
[Saying] “Now, brother, I reckon you can’t play ball nor roll the marble stone.”
“Now, brother, I reckon you can’t play ball nor roll the marble stone.”
Oh take my hunting shirt from me, and tear it from gore to gore,
And wrap it around my bleeding breast, that I might bleed no more,
And wrap it around my bleeding breast, that I might bleed no more.
He took his hunting shirt from him, and tore it from gore to gore,
He wrapped it around his bleeding breast, but it still bled the more.
He wrapped it around his bleeding breast, but it still bled the more.
O brother, when you go home tonight, my mother will ask for me.
You can tell her I’m gone with some little school boys, tomorrow night I’ll be at home.
You can tell her I’m gone with some little school boys, tomorrow night I’ll be at home.
If my little sister will ask for me, the truth to her you must tell.
You must tell her I’m dead, and in grave laid, And buried at Jessel town.
You must tell her I’m dead, and in grave laid, And buried at Jessel town.
Oh lay my Bible under my head, my *tommyhawk at my feet,
My bow and arrow across my breast, that I might sleep, sweet sleep.
My bow and arrow across my breast, that I might sleep, sweet sleep.
*Tomahawk