“Dolly Grey”
Description
"I have come to say goodbye, Dolly Grey; It's no use to ask me why, Dolly Grey; There's a murmur in the air... So it's time to do and dare, Dolly Grey." The singer bids Dolly a sad farewell and goes off to join the "boys in blue"
Notes
Meredith/Covell/Brown report this to have been popular during the first world war, though written some decades earlier.
According to Eversley Belfield, _The Boer War_, p. 13, Britain entered the Boer War "bursting with enthusiasm and self-confidence, many people thinking that it would be ended by Christmas [the ultimatum came October 9 and expired October 11]; the song 'Goodbye Dolly Gray' echoed popular feeling."
Spaeth's _A History of Popular Music in America_, p. 312, seems to imply it became a hit in 1900. - RBW
References
- Meredith/Covell/Brown, pp. 35-36, "Dolly Grey" (1 text, 1 tune)
- BI, MCB035