Sailor Boy- Daisy Watkins (WV) c.1915 Cox C
[My title. No date given (Barnes contributed to Cox in 1915). From Folk Songs of the South, Cox 1925. Cox's notes follow
R. Matteson 2017]
SWEET WILLIAM (THE SAILOR BOY)
The majority of the nine variants found in West Virginia are more or less incomplete. There is little variation in story but a good deal in phraseology.
Of this favorite English song texts have been printed or reported from Georgia (Journal, xxix, 199), Tennessee (xxx, 363), Ohio (xxxv, 410), North Carolina (Campbell and Sharp, No. 106; cf. F. C. Brown, p. 10), Missouri (Belden, No. 20), Nebraska (Pound, pp. 42, 69), Canada (Journal, xxxi, 170). An interesting copy from the MS. of a Confederate soldier is printed by Frank
Moore, Anecdotes, Poetry, and Incidents of the War (New York, 1866), p. 180. For references see Journal, xxx, 363; xxxv, 410; Campbell and Sharp, p. 334. Add Greig, Folk-Song of the North-East, LXIV; Journal of the Irish Folk-Song Society, XVII, 18; broadside ("The Sailor Boy and his Faithful Mary"), Harkness, Preston, No. 317.
C. [Sailor Boy] No local title. Communicated by Professor Walter Barnes, Fairmont, Marion County; obtained from Miss Daisy Watkins, who got it from her mother.
1 Away down on yon river side,
There where the waters so swiftly glide,
I heard a lovely lady mourn,
Saying, "What shall I do? My true love's gone."
2 She built herself a little boat,
That on the ocean she might float;
And every ship that she drew near,
She inquired for her William dear.
3 As she was sailing out from Maine[1],
She spied three ships coming from Spain;
She hailed them all as they drew near,
To inquire for her William dear.
4 "O captain, captain, tell me true,
Does my sweet William sail with you?
Tell me quick and give me joy,
For none will I have but my sweet sailor boy."
5 "O no, kind miss, he is not here;
He is in yonder deep, I fear;
On Rocky Island as we drew nigh,
There we left your sweet sailor boy."
6 She rowed her boat against a rock[2],
Just like some lady whose heart was broke.
7 She called for a chair to set upon,
And paper and ink to pen it down;
And at the end of every line she dropped a tear,
And at the end of every verse she cried, "O my dear!"
8 "Dig my grave both wide and deep;
Place marble stones at my head and feet;
And on my breast you may place my dove,
To tell the world that I died of love."
1. out on the main,
2. This stanza is written out as if lines 2 and 3 were missing-- however, I don't think that's accurate-- so I've changed it.