“My Wife Died on Saturday Night”

Description

"My wife died on Saturday night, Sunday she was buried, Monday was my courting day, and Tuesday I got married." "Round and round, up and down, everywhere I wander, Round and round, up and down, looking for my honey." That's all, folks.

Notes

A fragmentary song, really just floating verses and a dance tune. But it's indexed because, compact though it may be, that first verse tells a coherent story. - PJS

This verse, to be sure, is shared with "The Old Gray Goose (I) (Lookit Yonder)." But the rest goes in different directions.

To add to the confusion, there is a nursery rhyme (Baring-Gould-MotherGoose #131, p. 106):

I married a wife on Sunday,

She began to scold on Monday,

Bad was she on Tuesday,

Middling was she on Wednesday,

Worse she was on Thursday,

Dead was she on Friday,

Glad was I on Saturday night,

To bury my wife on Sunday.

The Baring-Goulds also compare the well-known poem of "Solomon Grundy." - RBW

Cross references

• cf. "The Old Gray Goose (I) (Lookit Yonder)" (floating verse)
• cf. "Way Down the Old Plank Road" (floating verse)

Recordings

• Dr. Humphrey Bate & his Possum Hunters, "My Wife Died on Saturday Night" (Brunswick 271, 1928)
• New Lost City Ramblers, "My Wife Died on Saturday Night" (on NLCR07, NLCRCD2)

References

1. Eddy 153 (last of several "fragments of Irish songs" - 1 fragment, which could be this or "The Old Gray Goose (I) (Lookit Yonder)")
2. SharpAp 202, "A Monday was my Courting Day" (1 text, 1 tune)
3. Roud #3619
4. BI, RcMWDOSN