Barbara Allen- Hattie Smith (ME) 1942 Flanders N
[From Flanders; Ancient Ballads 1961, notes by Coffin follow. This is much older than 1942, so far I have not definitively traced the informant. This version has the final stanza "warning", see Percy 1765 (Child Bd).
R. Matteson 2015]
Barbara Allen
(Child 84)
In America, "Barbara Allen" has the widest geographical spread and overall currency of any ballad. It is not quite so popular in Britain, in spite of the well-known comments by Samuel Pepys and Oliver Goldsmith concerning its excellence. Nor are there Western or Northern European analogues, although a Spanish romance treats the same theme (certainly not a unique one) and a Serbian song (see WF VIII, 371); is strikingly similar. The ultimate source of the Anglo-American texts has never been located, nor has James Graeme, the hero of the Scottish tradition, been identified "Barbara Allen" has a tradition in print, on broadsheets in song books, on the stage, that is particularly vigorous across Britain and America. As a result, the plot of the spiteful girl and the unhappy lover is much the same wherever the song is found. Nevertheless, all sorts of minor variations have crept into the texts. The ballad may open in the spring or at Martinmas; the lover's name may be William, James, David, etc., etc.; he may give Barbara gift as he dies; he may curse her; she may curse him; she may blame her parents for the whole mess; and so forth. Frequently, at least in this country, the song ends with a cliche: the "rose and briar" Stanza, the "turtle-dove" Stanza or a warning to "ye virgins all." Detailed discussions of the local texts are given by most editors. The best are in Arthur K. Davis' Traditional Ballads of Virginia (Cambridge, Mass., 1929), 302-4; in C. A. Smith's treatment the song in Musical Quarterly, II, 109; and in W. Roy MacKenzie's Ballads and Sea-Songs from Nova Scotia (Cambridge, Mass., 1928), 35. Coffin, 89-90, also gives a list of interesting variations that have occurred in the American texts. From such discussions one can see that the "rose-briar" ending (Flanders E-G), nor found in child, and the references to the tavern toasts in which Barbara was slighted (most of the Flanders texts) are the characteristic New World traits.
Flanders A-C follow Child A in the Martinmas opening and the hero's name. undoubtedly such texts stem from the Scottish tradition represented in J. S. Locke's Forget-Me-Not Songster, printed in Boston and known all over the Northeast. Flanders D f. are of the child B, a seventeenth-century broadside, type. This is the most widespread form of the song. The basin of blood and the gifts offered by the dying man to Barbara (see Flanders D, F, and G, for example) are not in Child B, though common enough in the northern American regions. As the song has been frequently localized, it is likely that Flanders E, entitled "Mary Alling," recalls some nineteenth-century belle. In a similar way, Flanders O may reflect local events. Phillips Barry, British Ballads from Maine, 200, notes a tale told around Newburg, Vermont, about a certain Barbara Allen who was jilted by her lover in favor of a girl he described as an "angel without wings." The Flanders H 1-3 and K 1-2 series offer interesting comparisons for the study of ballad variations and transmission. Flanders J, where the lover points to the basin where he "threw up" his heart's blood, teeters on comedy. And L, mentioning the Christmas Day Kissing, is unique.
Any song as popular as "Barbara Allen" will have many uses. Benjamin A. Botkin, American Play-Party Song (Lincoln, Nebraska, 1837), 58, cites its development as a game song. Coffin, 87-88 (American); Dean-Smith, 51, and Belden, 60-61 (English); and Greig and Keith, 67-70 (Scottish) give one a start on an extensive bibliography of texts from oral tradition. See Kitredge's notes in JAF, XXIX, 160-61, and XXX, 3I7, for song book and broadside references. Phillips Barry, British Ballads from Maine, 195-200, includes it.
With the exception of the Smith tune, all of the tunes for Child 84 are related. They can be subdivided as follows: 1) Richards, Degreenia, Reynolds; 2) Barlow; 3) Sullivan, Wilson, Armstrong, Halvosa, Fairbanks (which is also related to the Richards group, see end of line 1); 4) Bush; 5) Merrill; and 6) Braid, which is also close to the Sullivan group, at the beginning. Of the great multitude of related tunes, only a selected few, rather closely related ones are given. Relations are found for groups I and 4 to a greater extent than for the others.
N. Barbara Allen. Sung by Mrs. Hattie E. Smith of Springfield, Maine, who said: "My father taught me this song when I was a little girl, five or six years old." M. Olney, Collector; September 2, 1942.
Structure: stanza 1, A1 A2 A2 B (2, 2, 2, Z)--stanza 2, E1 E2 F G1- stanza 3, M N O G2- stanza 4, R S T U; Rhythm
C; Contour: each stanza an arc; Scale: stanza 1, hexatonic; t.c. E-stanza 2,major; t.c. first E, then Q-stanza 3, anhemitonic pentatonic; t.c. stanza 4, anhemitonic pentatonic; t.c. C. For mel. rel. see possibly FCB4, 62 (G) for stanza 1; for
others, see "Old Lang Syne."
In Scarlet Town where I did dwell,
There was a maiden dwelling;
Young Jimmy Grove did love her well;
Her name was Barbara Allen.
On the fifteenth day of May,
The green fields were a-blooming;
This young man to his death-bed lay
For the love of Barbara Allen.
So slowly she put on her gown,
So slowly she went to him;
And all she said when she got there
Was, "Young man, you are a-dying.
"For death is printed on your face
And sorrow on your bearing;
You never will be none the better for me,
Nor the love of Barbara Allen."
She had not got far out of town
Before the bells were tolling,
And with the tolling of the bells
Laughed cruel Barbara Allen.
She turned about to get her breath
And spied the funeral coming;
She laughed to see him pale in death.
O cruel Barbara Allen!
When he was buried in his grave,
Her heart did burst with sorrow.
"O mother, mother, make my bed,
For I shall die tomorrow!
"Now, maidens all, a warning take
And shun the way I fell in,
Or else your heart like mine will break;
Farewell!" said Barbara Allen.