The Suffolk Miracle (Child 272) - Peggy Seeger

There Was an Old and Wealthy Man / The Holland Handkerchief / The Suffolk Miracle (Child No. 272) - Sung by Peggy Seeger on "Blood and Roses Vol. 1" (1979). Note by Kevin W.: I don't know where Peggy got her version, but it is not unlike the one sung by Dol Small of Nellysford, Virginia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9UtcR3xtB8 Liner Notes: The spectre bridegroom - a story with which Slavs, Europeans, Scandinavians, Britons and Americana have been terrifying themselves for centuries. In its full traditional form, the tale is far more dramatic than in our ballad. The plot opens with two lovers who swear fealty to one another in life and death. When the man dies, the girl is inconsolable, His spirit comes for her and they ride through the night. He asks, "Do you not fear to ride with death?" She replies, "Why should I? I am with you." But when they near the graveyard, he rends her clothing and attempts to drag her physically into the grave with him, She is rescued in the nick of time, but the next morning every grave has upon it a piece of her smock or gown. It was because this story was so widespread and detailed that Child included - albeit apologetically - one poor text in hie definitive ballad collection. He believed that the ballad was not extant in Ireland or Scotland, a fact since disproved by the memories of American informants. Indeed, the ballad 1. rarely sung now in Britain, but it flourishes in America and Canada: and for pace, the New World is not excising the supernatural motifs. Phillips Barry, the excellent American ballad scholar, traces the "superior" North American variants back to the Scotto-Irish forms and the more informal - perhaps slovenly but very singable - southern versions to the Child broadside. Our text is from Virginia. In Child's set, the girl dies of horror and remorse. Rarely does she do so in the American texts, where we are usually warned in a moralising verse of the meddlesome habits of old (rich) parents. Occasionally, the final verse is given over to a lament, in which the girl vows to henceforth forswear all mankind. Song transcription: It's of an old and wealthy man, He had a daughter and her name was Ann. She were handsome, fine and tall, She had a loving face withal. Sing lady, lady, lady fair, Many a suitor had she there; A widow's son of low degree, Among them all, she fancied he. Sing courting, courting, courting cane, There's many a courtship all in vain, For when her father came to know He sent her far, O, far from home. One night as she were lying down, The quiet loosening of her gown; She heard a low and deathly sound, Says, "Loose my bonds, I'm earthly bound." She looked out of her window clear, She seen her love on her father's mare; Here's your mother's cloak, here's your father's roan They sent me here, love, to bring you home. He's mounted up, she's on behind, And they rode on with contented mind; But all along complaint he make, "O love, O love, my head do ache." Her handkerchief from her neck around, She bound it round his head, around; He set her down at her father's door, Then her true love she saw no more. "Awake, awake, awake!" said she, "Is no-one here for to welcome me?" "You're welcome home, dear child," said he, "But what trusty friend did come for thee?" Did you not send one I do adore, That love so dear, and must love no more? Her father frowned and shook his heed, Says, "'Your true love been one year dead." He's summoned clerk and clergy too, That grave was opened and him to view; And though he had been a twelvemonth dead, Her handkerchief was bound round his head. So a warning to you old folks still: Don't hinder young ones from their will. The first they love they'll never forget, Though he he dead, she'll love him yet.