The Willow Tree (Maid Freed from the Gallows)- Black (WV) 1916 Sharp C
[My title. From: English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians 1917; Collected by Olive Dame Campbell and Cecil J. Sharp; Edited Karpeles 1932, edition. His notes follow. This version also appears in Traditional Ballads of Virginia; Davis B.
R. Matteson 2012, 2015]
Notes: No. 24. The Maid Freed from the Gallows.
Texts without tunes:—Child, No. 95.
Texts with tunes:—English County Songs, p. 112. Folk Songs from Somerset, No. 121.
Journal of the Folk-Song Society, v., 228. American variants:—American Journal of Folk-Lore, xxi., 56; xxvi., 175. Musical
Quarterly, January, 1916, pp. 10 and 11 (without tunes). Wyman and Brockway's
Lonesome Tunes, p. 44.
C. [The Willow Tree] - Black (WV) 1916 Sharp C titled, Maid Freed from the Gallows.
1 "Hangman, hangman, spare my life,
Just spare my life a moment;
I think I hear my father coming,
A many, a many a mile."
2 Father, father, have you gold,
The gold to set me free,
Or have you come to see me hung
Beneath the willow tree?
3 Daughter, daughter, I have no gold,
Gold to set you free,
But I have come to see you hung
Beneath the willow tree.
In subsequent verses, "mother," "brother" "sister" and finally "true love" are substituted for "father."
15. True love, true love, I have the gold,
Gold to set you free,
And I shan't come to see you hung
Beneath the willow tree.