“Guysboro Song”
Description
The singer loses his parents and sister. He is treated badly by an uncle. He loses a captain's job at Canso: he drinks the freight and drowns 2 boys. On his other ship only 4 of 13 survive. He breaks his good knee in the Indies and decides to retire.
Supplemental text
Guysboro Song
Partial text(s)
*** A ***
From Helen Creighton, Songs and Ballads from Nova Scotia, #119, pp. 259-260.
"Sung by Mr. Ben Henneberry, Devil's Island."
Come, all ye landsmen, and young sailors too,
While I relate the hardships that I have gone through.
I have suffered some hardships and pain in my time,
Oh, I put them together and composed the rhyme.
(10 additional stanzas)
Notes
This song is item dD48 in Laws's Appendix II.
The ballad mentions Guysborough County as the singer's birthplace, and Canso Strait and Ingonish as locales of his "hardships and pain." Guysborough County and Canso are on the south coast of Nova Scotia; Ingonish is on the Cape Breton coast. - BS
References
- Creighton-NovaScotia 119, "Guysboro Song" (1 text, 1 tune)
- ST CrNS119 (Partial)
- Roud #1824
- BI, CrNS119