Sea Shanties

sad but true. oooh how we wish we were out in the great foggy turn heading to Ile Brion with a pod of finbacks wooshing to starboard . they sound like a great herd of steam engines just heating up in the still air. Caring for the big dum galloots can turn into an obsession if youve got a pulse and any feelings.Most whales , today, are lost by being hit by a large ship delivering an all important load of plywood or kraft paper to the strategic housing market of UK or Spain. The ships are so automated that once on a course , they rarely deviate. We felt like the Sea Shepherds this summer by notifying ships of pods of finbacks that were in an apparent collision course . This pisses the ships off because the Canadian Coast Guard monitors all channels and if a simple alert is given, the ships MUST respond by slowing and proceeding with evasive action if necessary. He He, I thought one of the STar hArdanger Ships waould have loved to ram us because we kept the radio full of alerts for finnys rights and belugas.
Yet , before we got to THe Rock, there was a dead finback near Sydney that was mortally gashed by a big steamer and floated near the Sydney area when we were going in for refueling we could see this great big herd of seagulls picking it apart and the radio info was that some ship ramn into it in an unavoidable collision, right. Probably capt Hazelwood on deck
Yaaaar

I think anything with "blow ye winds" in it qualifies as a shanty there, Letty.

Weigh, Haul Away (done from memory--incomplete)

When i was a little boy,
So my mother told, to me!

Weigh, haul away
We're bound for better weather, to me!

If i did not kiss the girls
My lips would all grow mouldy

Weigh, haul away
We're bound for better weather, to me!

Now first i met a Yankee girl
And she was fat and lazy

Weigh, haul away
We're bound for better weather, to me!

Then i met an Irish girl
She damned near drove me crazy

Weigh, haul away
We're bound for better weather, to me!

Well, weigh, haul away
We're bound for better weather, to me!
Weigh, haul away, we'll haul away Joe

King Louis was the King of France
Before the Rev-oh-loo-shy-un

Weigh, haul away
We're bound for better weather, to me!

Then he got his head cut off
It spoilt his con-sti-too-shy-un

Weigh, haul away
We're bound for better weather, to me!
Weigh, haul away, we'll haul away Joe.

This is a genuine work chanty. The sailors would weigh the anchor by pushing at the capstan. As they trudged around in a circle, the song would be sung in a slow measured meter. The phrase "to me!" is added both for the rhyme scheme, and for the extra thrust the men would make before pausing as a belaying pin would be shoved in the chock to prevent the anchor cable from backsliding. Belay means to stop, by the way--the expression "belay that" means, more or less, "never mind." Belaying pins were thrust into a chock at the base of the mast, and on the outer railing to hold the sheets and shrouds in place. A sheet is a line (rope) from the corner of the sail, which is used to control its "tautness" and position. A shroud is a line which holds the mast in place.

In South Australia i was born
Heave away, haul away
In South Australia, 'round Cape Horn
We're bound for South Australia

Haul away you rollin' boys
Heave away, haul away
Haul away you rollin' boys
We're bound for South Australia

(another fragment of one of the working chanties)

The susquehanna River had a number of rope ferries that would run from island to island and then across. The rope ferries used a log line to allow the line to go slack and let the paddlewheelers go through without chewing the ropwe to shreds. When they wished to cross at the Lower River they would taught the line and pull the ferry raft via a big pulley. They had a rope song that , weve found one verse at the Pa Dutch Society

goes like this ahem

Ziek da Shtrick
mach es quick
Ivver da revver
Sell iss Trick

repeat verse one till youre damn sick of the whole thing, then, unless , youre the HULK, someone just sez ZIEK, ZIEK ZIEK (pull, pull pull)

Pa Dutch is a dialect made up of German, English, and some Susquehannock or Leni Lenape Indian words, so its a very regionally diverse dialect. Dutchmen in Allentown could alomost not understand Dutchmen in the Lower Susquehanna

Old Spice means quality said the captain to the bos'n
So look for the package with the ship that sails the ocean
(yo ho, yo ho)

The Roving Kind
Guy Mitchell
Written by Jesse Cavanaugh and Arnold Stanton

Peaked at # 4 in 1951
Competing versions by The Weavers hit # 11 and by Rex Allen hitt #20.
Adapted from the old 1800s English folk song "The Pirate Ship."


(She had a dark and a-rovin' eye-uh-eye and her hair hung down in ring-a-lets)
(She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind)


As I cruised out one eve-e-ning upon a night's career
I spied a lofty clipper ship and to her I did steer
I heisted out my sig-a-nals which she so quickly knew
And when she saw my bunting fly she imme-diately hove to-woo-woo

(She had a dark and a-rovin' eye-uh-eye and her hair hung down in ring-a-lets)
(She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind)

I took her for some fish and chips and treated her so fine
And hardly did I realize she was the rovin' kind
I kissed her lips, I missed her lips and found to my surprise
She was nothin' but a pirate ship rigged up in a dis-guy-eye-ise

(She had a dark and a-rovin' eye-eye-eye)
And her hair hung down in ring-a-lets
(She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind)

So, come all ye good sailor men who sail the wintry sea
And come, all ye apprentice lads, a warnin' take from me
Beware of lofty clipper ships, they'll be the ruin of you
For 'twas there she made me walk the plank and pushed me under, too-ooh-ooh

(She had a dark and a-rovin' eye-uh-eye and her hair hung down in ring-a-lets)
She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind

(She was a nice girl, a proper girl but)
One of the rovin' kind (yo-ho!)

Does anyone know a shanty that is written for kedging/
I always wondered how such a task could be done without choreographed movement and rowing on key

Pinched this from a site:




I would suspect that kedging would involved more capstan work, hauling in a heavy anchor from the bottom would be a longer and less exacting task than the efforts needed to trim sails or go about.

Well, farmer. I see that Grant finally taken Richmond.

sorry, can't help ya. Don't know what kedging means. Soooooooo,
Paint me a picture.

Weigh, haul away would be the capstan variety . . .

South Australia could be that, or sung more quickly, could be used as a halyard chanty

And here's part of one describing a far-too common event in the sailor's life:

When I was a walking out one day
Down by the London River
A pretty little fair maid I chanced to spy
Now we walked along together
Her lips were like two roses red
A fine feather bonnet was covering her head
So I took the harboard on her, she said she was a maid
That saucy little trim-rigged doxy


I shan't and I can't go along with you
You saucy ramblin' sailor
My parents now they would not agree
And I'm promised to a tailor
But I was all too eager to sample all her charms
A dearest guinea to roll in your arms
Well the deal was done, up stairs we went
That's me and the trim-rigged doxy


Well it's all on the bone and let your stays'ls fall
We was yard after yard a boppin'
Me shot-locker empty, it's asleep I fall
Was then that she took to robbin'
She emptied all me pockets of all that I had
She even took the boots from the end of the bed
She even took the gold watch from underneath me head
`That saucy little trim-rigged doxy

Setanta, you'll like this one:

I thought I heard the old man say
John Kanaka-naka too lie ay
Today, today is a holiday
John Kanaka-naka too lie ay
Too lie ay, oh, to lie ay
John Kanaka-naka too lie ay

We'll work tomorrow but no work today
We'll work tomorrow but no work today

We're bound away for 'Frisco Bay
We're bound away at the break of day

We're bound away 'round Cape Horn
We wish to Christ we'd never been born

Oh haul, oh haul, oh haul away
Oh haul away and make your pay

And we are Liverpool born and bred
We're strong in the arm but we're thick in the head

That's delightful, Ol' Still . . .

Letty:

kedging
1) A method of pulling a boat out of shallow water when it has run aground. A dinghy is used to set an anchor, then the boat is pulled toward the anchor. Those steps are repeated until the boat is in deep enough water to float.
2) A traditionally shaped anchor (ie a kedge. Mr S.)having flukes perpendicular to the stock of the anchor and connected by a shank. These are less common than modern anchors such as the plow and lightweight anchors.

Which reminds me of Johnny Todd, also known as The Liverpool Tide. Sung at a moderate tempo, it would be for haulin' in the sheets . . .

Johnny Todd he took a notion
For to cross the raging tide,
And he left his true love behind him
Weeping on the Liverpool side.

For a week she wept full sorely,
Tore her hair and wrung her hands
Till she met with another sailor
Walking on the Liverpool sands.

O fair maid why are you weeping
For your Johnny gone to sea?
If you'll wed with me tomorrow
I will kind and constant be.

I will buy you sheets and blankets,
I'll buy you a wedding ring.
You shall have a gilded cradle
For to rock your baby in.

Johnny Todd came home from sailing,
Far across the ocean wide,
There he found that his fair and false one
Was another sailor's bride.

So, all you lads who go a-sailing
For to fight the foreign foe.
Never leave your true love like Johnny,
Marry her before you go!

Thanks, Mister. Whatever floats your boat...he he..don't you hate that expression?

Setanta, Tell me what you DON'T know.

Arrrrr, mateys...gotta eat some cheese.

letty, lotsa times sailing vessels got stuck on banks and rises or just ran out of wind. So they would take a special anchor called a kedge or Danforth anchor and row it out in front of the vessel and drop it by a warping line so it would stick in the cracks of the bottom( the design of the anchor gave it a short stock and huge flipper like spades that dug in or caught on the rocky bottom. Then, and Im not making this up, with a bunch of dinghies full of men , they would pull the vessel up to the fixed anchor by pulling the warp line on the top part of the capstan or they would row their asses off and try to pull the boat forward.

This is analogous to having a truck stuck in the mud, and, with a winch and an available tree, youd pull yourself out by using the tree as a solid yank point.

Kedging was such a tough act requiring lotrs of coordinated pulling that , I just thought they had to have a special ditty with a lot of swear words
Mr Stillwater was drawing our attention to the fact that weighing anchor was probably just as brutal and the kedging songs may have been the same as the weighing shanties, brutal hardass back breaking over and over again songs. No sir, not me. I call the Coast Guard, of course you get a lecture from the USCG and they always try to find something you did wrong but, im grateful theyre out there.

Wow! farmerman. That brought to mind Stravinsky's "Song of the Volga Boatmen." However, Yo heave ho is all I know.

I appreciate the nautical info; however, I'm not very sea worthy.

Looks like I missed the entire page with this "kedging" item nicely discussed by Mr S and setanta. oh well, Im always amazed how big sailing boats got anywhere at all. I have pictures of our town of Eastport Maine , where there could be hundreds of square riggers all moored and tied off to each other. If there ever was a fire, (and there often were in early days of coal stoves on the sailboats and early steam vessels) you could lose the entire fleet because itd take hours or even days to get the boats loose and out of there.