From the Joseph McGinnis Manuscript Come all you jovial shipmates That reef and furl the sails As we batter round Cape Horn In the cold and bitter gales There is a thought to cheer us As round the world we roam: It’s to kiss a pretty fair maid When our ship comes home.Chorus When our…

Ed Adams from Ivar Haglund. Ivar was a colorful figure from the Pacific Northwest who may have collected or written this song. Some of his songs may be found in An Ivar Book of Ballads from Puget Sound by Ivar Haglund and George Frederick McKay. [Note: New information (to me) on this song is appended…

From Sam Hazel, Mississippi Sam Hazel learned this song on Ohio River steamboats working between Louisville, Kentucky and Evansville, Indiana. Source: Recorded in 1939 by Herbert Halpert under joint sponsorship of the Library of Congress and the WPA. Recording now held by the Archive of Folk Culture at the American Folklife Center at the Library…

From Rees Baldwin, Barry Dock, Wales Source: The James Madison Carpenter Collection, AFC 1972/001 Cylinder 048 10:40 Here we come home in a leaky ship A leaky ship, a leaky ship Here we come home in a leaky ship Away, boys, away.

The anchor is down and the sails are furled, and the harbor gaskets passed. Lay down from aloft, clear up the deck, The voyage is finished at last.Chorus: The voyage is finished at last, my boys The voyage is finished at last. There are twenty crimps in twenty boats And the runners grasp my hand…

Written by John Archbold who was a member of the Toronto Morris Men singing round the campfire at the Martitme Festival at Penetanguishene a few (now more than a few!) years back. The song is based mostly on his father’s experiences at sea. Now it’s many’s the day since I first sailed away With my…

Lyrics from Sailors’ Delight, edited by Cicely Fox Smith, published by Methuen & Co., London, UK, 1931, pp. 9-10; first published in Punch magazine, Volume 180, May 20, 1931, p. 546.; Music by Alan Fitsimmons. Stan Hugill had some wonderful tales on this theme – and told them with a sparkle in his eye! “Shanghai…

From Mary Wheeler’s book Steamboatin’ Days: Folk Songs of the River Packet Era. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana University Press, 1944 pp. 94-97). Uncle Bud also appears in Zydeco songs with rather ‘colorful’ lyrics! Well old Uncle Bud comin’ down the road, Haulin’ women by the wagon load. Chorus: Uncle Bud, Uncle Bud, Uncle Bud, Bud, doggone…

My singing of this song is amalgamated from multiple sources including a version from longshoremen of the Ball Steamship Company in Tampa Florida (AFC 7092 B2 – primary melody, verses 1 and 3), a menhaden fishing version released on the LP Virgina Traditions, sung by Walter Kegler and the crew of the Barnegat, recorded 8…

Song by Phil & June Colclough, new melody by Dick Swain Dick Swain found this text in a collection of British poetry and gave it this tune. When I heard him sing it, I knew I had to learn it. Thanks Dick. May the Harpoon rust, may the cold steel be gone May be seas…