US & Canada Versions: 164 King Henry Fifth's Conquest of France
[The two accepted traditional versions were collected by Henry from the same source (probably Council Harmon or a Hick's relative) by two informants- Mr. Sam Harmon (version B) and his wife (version A), and by Flanders from E.C. Green (Barry also recorded Green two times). Both the Harmon and Green versions, collected in the early 1930s, have been reprinted several times, first in BFSSNE by Barry.
The title, King Henry Fifth's Conquest of France, had been assigned from the Child ballad title by the collectors and was not local.
Niles gives three additional versions in his ballad book, 1961, that, according to Niles, were collected from 1913 to 1932. Niles A seems to be fashioned after the Harmon version. It seems likely that these three versions are recreations -- possibly from traditional fragments. The question remains: Since Niles had a hitherto unknown Child ballad in 1913 why didn't he come forward with this historic find?
R. Matteson 2012, 2015]
CONTENTS: (To access individual versions, click on the blue highlighted title below)
1) The Tennis Balls- Napier (KY) 1913 Niles C
2) Proud King Henery- Harmon (TN-NC) 1930 Henry A, B
3) Proud King Henry- Green (VT-ME) 1931 Flanders
4) The Fency King- French (KY) 1932 Niles A
5) Henry's Tribute- Roberts (KY) 1932 Niles B
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Mellinger Henry's notes, 1938, Folk-Songs and Ballads from the Southern Highlands:
KING HENRY FIFTH'S CONQUEST OF FRANCE (Child, No. 164)
This ballad had not hitherto been found in America before the summer of 1930 at which time it was recorded by Mrs. Henry. It is something of a coincidence that a letter received by the editor just before the discovery and recording of "King Henry Fifth's Conquest of France" expressed the insistent opinion of an experienced expert in ballad collecting that no more ballads would ever be discovered in the South. Added interest comes from the fact that another version of the ballad was taken down by Mrs. Helen H. Flanders from the singing of Mr. E. C. Green at Springfield, Vermont, on August 20, 1931, and printed in the Springfield (Mass.) Sunday Union on August 30. Mr. Barry has printed in Bulletin, No. 4, p. 10, the text and melody transcribed from two phonograph records made by him of the singing of Mr. Green on October 20 and 21, 1931.
The following texts, A and B, of this ballad together with the head-notes are reprinted by courtesy of the New Jersey Journal of Education, Vol. XX, Nos. 3—4, pp. 6—7 and the Bulletin of the Folk-Song Society of the Northeast, Number 2, pp. 5—6. The air included with A was not given in either of these. In regard to the texts A and B from the same source Mr. Phillips Barry remarks (Bulletin, p. 6): "One feature of the tradition, the preservation of two texts in the same family, is easily accounted for. Mr. and Mrs. Harmon are step-brother and step-sister; they learned their songs from the same source, namely Grandfather Hicks, from whom, apparently, the Harmon songs have come. That 'ballads run in the families' is a truism. Certain aspects, however, of family tradition require closer study. It would be worth while to know why some ballads and not others have accumulated in the tradition of a given family."
In the summer of 1928, some traditional ballads had been recorded from the singing of members of the Harmon family of Cade's Cove, Tennessee. Others were taken down by some individuals of the family and forwarded by mail. One of the most interesting of the latter is a fine text of the rare "Lamkin." Meantime this entire family of Tennessee mountaineers, numbering more than a dozen persons, was compelled to sell their property holdings to the Great Smoky National Park Commission and to remove to the mountains of northern Georgia. Though rather inaccessible and quite isolated, a visit was contemplated by the writer to their new abode during the summer of 1930 for the purpose of recording a promised version of "The Gypsy Laddie." Then the unexpected happened. On the writer's return from a camping trip to Thunderhead the entire family suddenly appeared in Cade's Cove for a visit. "Uncle" Sam Harmon and his wife, "Aunt" Polly, spent the best part of two days singing at the mountain cabin of the writer. Twenty-four songs were recorded, many of them traditional ballads from England. Some of the songs recorded are: "The Lass of Roch Royal", "The Gypsy Laddie", "The Farmer's Curst Wife", "The Wife Wrapped in Wether's Skin", "The Yorkshire Bite", "The Cruel Mother", "The Two Sisters" (two texts), "The Goodman", "The Mermaid", "Sweet Trinity", "Lady Alice", "Broomfield Hill", "The Bamboo Brier", "Home, Daughter, Home", "I Loved a Lass", "Two Little White Babes", "The Lexington Girl", "The Butcher Boy", and "King Henry the Fifth's Conquest of France", the ballad below.
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KING HENRY FIFTH'S CONQUEST OF FRANCE- Sung by E.C. Green of Vermont, probably learned circa 1868 from his grandmother who lived in Maine, as it appears in the New Green Mountain Songster, Flanders et al, 1939.
A king was sitting on his throne,
And on his throne was sitting he;
He bethought himself of a tribute due,
Been due in France so many years.
Then he called up his little page,
His little page then called he;
Saying, "You must go to the king of France
And demand that tribute due to me."
Away, away went that little page,
Away, away and away went he,
Until he came to the king of France,
Then he fell down on his bended knee.
"My master's great as well as you,
My master's great as well as you;
He demands that tribute, tribute due,
Or in French land you will him see."
"Your master's young, of tender age,
Nor fit to come to my degree;
To him I send five tennis balls,
That in French land he dare not be."
Away, away went that little page,
Away, away and away went he,
Until he came to his master dear,
Then he fell down on his bended knee.
"What news, what news, my little page
What news, what news do you bring to me?"
"Such news, such news, my master dear
The king and you will not agree."
"He says you're young, of tender age,
Not fit to come to his degree;
To you he sends five tennis balls,
That in French land you dare not be."
The king he numbered up his men,
One by two and two by three,
Until he got thirty thousand men,
A noble jolly bold company.
"No married men, no widow's son,
No married men can follow me;
No married men, no widow's son,
A widow's son can't follow me."
Now he's marched off to the King of France
With drums and trumpets so merrily
And the first that spoke was the King of France
Saying, "Yonder comes proud King Henry"
The first broadside those Frenchmen gave
They slew our men so bitterly;
And the next broadside our English gave
They killed five thousand and thirty-three.
And the next that spoke was the King of France
Saying: "Lord, have mercy on my men and me."
"Now if you'll march back from whence you came
With drums and trumpets so merrily,
The finest flower in all French land,
Five tons of gold shall be your fee."
Now he's marched back from whence he came
With drums and trumpets so merrily
W'ith the finest flower in all French land
Five tons of gold now is his fee.
Excerpt from The British Traditional Ballad in North America
by Tristram Coffin 1950, from the section A Critical Biographical Study of the Traditional Ballads of North America
164. KING HENRY THE FIFTH'S CONQUEST OF FRANCE
'Texts: BFSSNE, II, 5; IV, 10 / Flanders, Cntry Sgs Vt, 36 / Flanders, New On Mt Sgstr, 193 / Henry, F-S So Hghlds, 108 / JAFL, XLV, 17 / N.J. Journal of Educ, XX, #s 3-4, 6-7 / PMLA, XLVIII, 307.
Local Titles: King Henry the Fifth's Conquest of France.
Story Types: A: King Henry decides to collect a tribute from the King of France. He sends a page abroad, and the messenger brings back some tennis balls as the French monarch's reply. Henry then musters an army of men, none married, none sons of widows. He attacks France, and, after withstanding the first onslaught, triumphs. With a bribe of the French princess and a large amount of gold he returns to England.
Examples: Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr; Henry, F-S So HgHds.
Discussion: The American stories differ little from Child or from each other. The ballad is extremely rare in this country, although the discovered texts have been frequently reprinted.
For an analysis of the relation of this ballad to the Alexander romance see Child, III, 322 and Flanders, New Gn Mt Sgstr, 195. The parallel between Alexander's insult from Darius and his marriage to Roxanna to the events in the ballad is stressed. The balls and the references to the eventual victor's tender years are in both stories.