In Jersey- Nancy Giannotti (NJ) 1926 Henry C
[My title. From Mellinger Henry, Folk-Songs from the Southern Highlands (New York: J. J. Augustin, 1938). His notes follow.
R. Matteson 2017]
57 THE BUTCHER BOY
While versions, C, D, E, and F of this song were not from the Southern Highlands, they were recalled by the reading of versions A and B, and are included for the sake of comparison. See W. Roy Mackenzie's "The Quest of the Ballad," p. 9; Cox, No. 145; Pound, No. 24; Lomax, p. 397; Sandburg, p. 3 24 (title is "London City"); Spaeth, "Weep Some More, My Lady," p. 128 (title is "In Jersey City"); Journal, XXIX, 169; XXXI, 73; XXXV, 360; XXXIX, 122; Phillips Barry, Ancient British Ballads, etc. (A privately printed list), No. 41; Arthur Palmer Hudson's "Specimens of Mississippi Folk-Lore," p. 31; Bradley Kincaid's My Favorite Mountain Ballads and Old-Time Songs, Chicago, 1928, p. 43 ; Flanders and Brown, p. 15.
C. [In Jersey] This version of the song did not come from the South. It was obtained from Miss Nancy Giannotti, Dickinson High School, Jersey City, New Jersey, 1926, who after hearing various versions of the song, then recorded the version of the song as she knew it.
1. In Jersey where I did dwell,
A butcher's son, he loved so well.
He stole my heart away from me,
And now with me he would not stay.
2. In that same city there lived a girl,
And that is where his love went to.
He took her right upon his knee,
And now with me he would not stay.
3. I went upstairs to make the bed;
Without a word to mother I said.
I took a pen and set me down,
And on a paper 1 wrote down.
4. Her father came home and looked around,
And could not find his daughter bright.
He went upstairs and broke the door,
And saw her hanging on a rope.
5. And on her breast these words were found:
"Oh, dig my grave and dig it deep
With a marble stone from head to feet;
And on my dove a golden love,
To show the world I died for love."