Sailor Boy- Matilda Heishman (WV) 1901 Cox B
[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.
B. "The Sailor Boy." Communicated by Mr. J. Harrison Miller, Wardensville, Hardy County, June, 1917; brought into the community sixteen years before by Matilda Heishman.
1 Way down on Moment's river side,
The wind blew fair a gentle glide;
A very pretty maid sat there a-moan,
"O what shall I do? My true love's gone.
2 "If ten thousand were enrolled,
My love would make the brightest show,
The brightest show of every one;
I'll have my true love or else have none.
3 "It was early in the spring,
He went on sea to serve his king;
The day was clear, the wind blew fair,
Which parted me and my dearest dear.
4 "I'll build myself a little boat,
And on the ocean I will float;
And every ship that I pass by,
I'll inquire of my sweet sailor boy."
5 She had not been sailing long on the deep
Before a ship she chanced to meet;
She cried, "Captain, captain, tell me true,
Does my sweet Billy stay with you?"
6 "O no, kind miss, he is not here;
He is lost in the deep, O I do fear;
On Greenland's Isle, as we passed by,
Here we lost a fine sailor boy."
7 She wrung her hands into her hair,
Just like one who is in despair;
Against a rock she ran her boat:
"O what shall I do? My true love's gone."
8 The water did wave and the sea did roar,
It washed his body on the shore ;
She viewed his body on every part,
With melting tears and a broken heart.
9 With pen and paper she wrote a song;
She wrote it wide and she wrote it long;
At the end of every line she dropped a tear,
At the end of every word cried, " Billy, my dear!"