There Was a Farmer- Griffin (GA-FL) c.1877 Morris
[From Folksongs of Florida; Morris, 1950. Notes from Morris are found at the bottom of this page.
Mrs. G. A. Griffin was Morris' best informant. She learned many of her folk songs from her father, a fiddler, when she lived in Georgia. Because she was born in 1863 (died in 1944) and left her home moved to Newberry, Florida in 1877, the date should be pre-1877. Alan Lomax also recorded her on his 1939 Southern recording trip.
R. Matteson 2013]
169. THE SUFFOLK MIRACLE
(Archive 958-AI and 976-BI; Child, No, 272)
"There Was a Farmer"- Recorded from the singing of Mrs. G. A. Griffin, Newberry, who learned this song from her father.
There was a farmer lived in our town,
A farmer we knew, we knew full well;
He had one daughter most beauty bright,
And on that daughter takened a great desire.
He sent her away, yes, forty long miles,
To her uncle's house with a discontent;
Yes, forty long miles, and did he send;
To her uncle's house with a discontent.
As she was setting on her bedside,
A quiet loosening at her gown,
She heard a deep and mourning sound;
"Unloose them bands," says the deepest wound.
She knew her father's horse so well,
Her mother's saddle and her safeguard, too,
She dressed herself in the array she died
For to ride along as her heart's desire.
As she was riding all alone,
He made his moans that his head did ache;
A handkerchief she out her pulled,
And tied around his heavy brow.
As they was riding all alone,
As riding as hard as hard wind could blow.
A kissing of his cold clay lips,
Saying, "Yes, my dear, you're as cold as clay."
"Go in, go in, and go to bed,
And I will see your horse well fed;
Go in, go in, and go to bed,
And I will see your horse well fed."
The old man cried, "Who's at my door?"
"It is your daughter, Father," she replied;
"It is your daughter, Father," she replied,
"And did you send my love for me?"
This old man knowing he's been so long twelve months dead,
Till it made the hair rise upon his head.
So early next morning this old man rose,
Straightway to the grave, the grave to undo.
He dug, he dug, full thirty feet deep,
He dug, he dug till he found a handkerchief.
He had been so long twelve months dead,
But the handkerchief was around his head.
Notes by Morris: In many modern survivals of the old ballads the-supernatural has been deleted or rationalized. "The Suffolk Miracle" is a notable exception. In the Florida variant, though certain hiatuses in the meaning make this narrative difficult to follow, the supernatural element is noticeably retained. Distinctive in the Florida variant is a speaking wound which orders the lady to unloose the bands binding it, and, as in most versions, the ghost rider who rides as "hard as wind can blow" plays a major role. "The Suffolk Miracle" is one of the ballads that transmission and transplanting to these shores have improved, for the Child versions ate definitely literary in style and feeble in narrative execution.
For other American texts, see Cox, pp. 152-153; Davis, pp. 482-484; Sharp, I, 261-266; Barcy, Eckstorm, and Smyth, p. 314; Flanders, Ballard, Brown, and Barry, pp. 86-87; Davis, Folksongs, p. 31; and Randolph, I, 179-180.