The Greenwood Side- (KY) c.1914 McGill
[From McGill, Folk Songs of the Kentucky Mountains, with music, 1917. Josephine McGill was born (1877) and raised in Louisville Kentucky to Mr. and Mrs. B.C. McGill. She traveled to New York to study piano and voice but spent most of her life in Louisville. In the summer of 1914, McGill traveled to Hindeman School in the Cumberland Mountains of Kentucky at the suggestion of Hindeman co-founder May Stone, to collect folk songs and ballads. McGill returned the summer of 1915 and her collection of 20 songs was published with music in 1917. McGill included the names of the informants but did not assign those names to any specific song, therefore we don't know who exactly sang "Greenwood Side."
R. Matteson 2014]
THE GREENWOOD SIDE.
There was a lady in yonder town,
Alone, alonie O;
She's taken her a walk one day
Down by the greenwood sidey 0.
She leaned her back against a thorn,
Alone, alonie O;
And there her two little babes were born
Down by the greenwood sidey O.
She drew a penknife from her side,
Alone, alonie O;
She took her two little babies' lives
Down by the greenwood sidey O.
She passed along again one day,
Alone, alonie O;
She saw her two little babes at play
Down by the greenwood sidey O.
"O babes, O babes, if you were mine,"
Alone, alonie O;
"I'd dress you up in silk so fine"
Down by the greenwood sidey O.
"O mother, O mother, when we were yours,"
Alone, alonie O;
"You neither allowed us coarse nor fine"
Down by the greenwood sidey O.
"You drew a penknife from your side,"
Alone, alonie O;
"You took your two little babies' lives"
Down by the greenwood sidey O.
"Seven long years you've rested well,"
Alone, alonie O;
"The rest of your life you'll spend in hell"
Down by the greenwood sidey O.