“Ben Bolt”

Description

"Oh! don't you remember sweet Alice, Ben Bolt, Sweet Alice, with hair so brown She wept with delight when you gave her a smile, And trembled with dear at your frown." But Alice now lies in the churchyard, and the mill where they courted is dried up

Supplemental text

Ben Bolt
  Complete text(s)

          *** A ***

From sheet music published 1843 by W. C. Peters
Title page inscribed
         BEN BOLT
            or
   OH! DONT YOU REMEMBER
          Ballad
         Sung By
     MISS CLARA BRUCE
       COMPOSED BY
      NELSON KNEASS

(The interior notes that it was also sung by J. H. McCann.
The name of Thomas Dunn English, who wrote the words, is
nowhere mentioned.)

Oh! don't you remember sweet Alice, Ben Bolt
Sweet Alice, with hair was so brown;
She wept with delight when you gave her a smile,
And trembled with fear at your frown.
In the old church yard, in the valley, Ben Bolt
In a corner obscure and alone,
They have fitted a slab of granite so gray,
And sweet Alice lies under the stone.
They have fitted a slab of granite so gray,
And sweet Alice lies under the stone.

2nd V.
Oh! don't you remember the wood, Ben Bolt,
Near the green sunny slope of the hill;
Where oft we have sung 'neath its wide spreading shade,
And kept time to the click of the mill:
The mill has gone to decay, Ben Bolt,
And a quiet now reigns all around,
See the old rustic porch with its roses so sweet,
Lies scatter'd and fallen to the ground,
See the old rustic porch, with its roses so sweet,
Lies scatter'd and fallen to the ground.

3rd V.
Oh! don't you remember the school, Ben Bolt,
And the Master so kind and so true,
And the little nook by the clear running brook,
Where we gahter's the flow'rs as they grew.
On the Master's grave grows the grass, Ben Bolt,
And the running little brook is now dry;
And of all the friends who were schoolmates then,
There remains Ben, but you and I.
And of all the friends who were schoolmates then,
There remains Ben, but you and I.

Notes

Originally published as a poem in _The New Mirror_ of September 2, 1843. Various tunes were offered; that by Nelson F. Kneass (made in 1848) proved the most enduring. It is possible that it was an adaptation of another tune.

T. D. English did not receive royalties for the popular editions of the song, and Spaeth (_A History of Popular Miusic in America_, p. 123) reports that he "came to resent [the song's] enormous popularity as compared with what he considered his more important efforts." Where have we heard *that* before? - RBW

Same tune

• Answer to Ben Bolt (broadside LOCSheet, sm1854 741250, "Answer to Ben Bolt," W. C. Peters and Sons (Cincinnati), 1854 (tune)

Cross references

• cf. "Sam Holt" (tune & meter)

References

1. Dean, pp. 31-32, "Ben Bolt" (1 text)
2. RJackson-19CPop, pp. 30-34, "Ben Bolt" (1 text, 1 tune)
3. Silber-FSWB, p. 252, "Ben Bolt" (1 text)
4. DT, BENBOLT
5. ST RJ19030 (Full)
6. Roud #2653
7. BI, RJ19030