Johnny Walk Along to Hilo

DESCRIPTION: Shanty, with chorus, "Johnny walk along to Hilo, Oh, poor old man, Oh, wake her, oh, shake, her, Oh, wake that gal with the blue dress on!" The verses usually consist of a scattering of lines from assorted Black and minstrel songs
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1843 (William Cullen Bryant; see Notes)
KEYWORDS: shanty nonballad
FOUND IN: US(MA,SE) West Indies
REFERENCES (15 citations):
Doerflinger-SongsOfTheSailorAndLumberman, p. 72, "Johnny Walk Along to Hilo" (1 text, 1 tune)
Colcord-SongsOfAmericanSailormen, p. 102, "Johnny Come Down to Hilo" (1 text, 1 tune)
Hugill-ShantiesFromTheSevenSeas, pp. 266-268, "Johnny Come Down to Hilo," "The Gal With the Blue Dress" (3 texts, 3 tunes) [AbEd, pp. 196-197]
Sharp-EnglishFolkChanteys, XVI, p. 19, "O Johnny Come to Hilo" (1 text, 1 tune)
Kinsey-SongsOfTheSea, pp. 60-61, "Johnny Come Down to Hilo" (1 text, 1 tune)
Lomax/Lomax-AmericanBalladsAndFolkSongs, pp. 483-485, "Johnny Come Down to Hilo" (1 text, 1 tune)
Morris-FolksongsOfFlorida, #24, "O Johnny Come to Hilo" (1 text, which appears to mix the chorus of "Johnny Walk Along to Hilo" with words from "Poor Old Man (Poor Old Horse; The Dead Horse)")
Terry-TheShantyBook-Part1, #4, "Johnny Come Down to Hilo" (1 text, 1 tune)
Abrahams-DeepTheWaterShallowTheShore, pp. 4,98-99, "Johnny Come Down With a Hilo" (2 texts, 1 tune)
Brown/Schinhan-FrankCBrownCollectionNCFolklore5 784, "When Johnnie Comes Down to Hilo" (1 text, 1 tune)
Brand-BawdySeaSong 7[A], "Johnnie Come Down the Hilo" (1 text)
Zander/Klusmann-CampSongsNThings, p. 32, "Johnny Comes Down to Hilo" (1 text, 1 tune)
Zander/Klusmann-CampSongsPopularEdition, p. 37, "Johnny Come Down to Hilo" (1 text)
DT, JOHNHILO*
ADDITIONAL: William Cullen Bryant, "Letter XI. The Interior of South Carolina" in _Letters of a Traveller_, 2nd edition (1850 ("Digitized by Internet Archive")), pp. 85-86, ("Johnny come down de hollow" (1 text)
Roud #650
RECORDINGS:
Pete Seeger, "Johnny Come Down to Hilo" (on PeteSeeger04)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Uncle Ned" (floating lyrics)
ALTERNATE TITLES:
Johnny Come Down the Backstay
Johnny Come to Hilo
Shake Her, Johnny, Shake Her!
NOTES [164 words]: Doerflinger-SongsOfTheSailorAndLumberman says of this song that it was "doubtless invented by colored shellbacks, but [was] just as popular with whites" -- and indeed, Doerflinger-SongsOfTheSailorAndLumberman's version is in white dialect while Lomax has a Black text. Even more interestingly, they don't have any lyrics in common except the chorus -- Doerflinger-SongsOfTheSailorAndLumberman's only lyric is from "Uncle Ned," which the Lomax version does not quote. - RBW
Bryant heard "Johnny Come Down de Hollow" at a South Carolina plantation corn-shucking. He writes that it "was set to a singularly wild and plaintive air, which some of our musicians would do well to reduce to notation." The response to each line is "Oh hollow!" The call lines are "Johnny come down de hollow," "De nigger-trader got me," "De speculator bought me," "I'm sold for silver dollars," "Boys, go catch de pony," "Bring him round de corner," "I'm going away to Georgia" and "Boys, good-by forever." - BS
Last updated in version 6.7
File: Doe072a

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