Ambletown

DESCRIPTION: A sailor receives a letter, telling him that his child has been born. He reports that it's "home I want to be" (to see the child and learn its gender), and intends to take ship there at the first opportunity
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1948 (Shay)
KEYWORDS: children family sailor separation home
FOUND IN:
REFERENCES (5 citations):
Hugill-ShantiesFromTheSevenSeas, p. 499, "Home, Dearie, Home" (1 text, 1 tune, in which the sailor's wife, rather than sending a letter, comes to him in a dream) [AbrEd, pp. 366]
Shay-AmericanSeaSongsAndChanteys, pp. 144-145, "Home, Dearie, Home" (1 text plus a stanza of Henley's adaption and an alternate chorus, plus a text of "Bell-Bottom Trousers," 1 tune)
Silber/Silber-FolksingersWordbook, p. 91, "Home, Boys, Home" (1 text)
NorthCarolinaFolkloreJournal, Andra Joy Hamilton, "A Garland of Ballads from Caldwell County", Vol. 3, No. 1 (Jul 1955), p. 5, "At Home, My Lassie" (1 fragment, 1 tune, so short that it might be "Ambletown" or "Rosemary Lane" [Laws K43] or any other member of the family; there is no seduction, just the "Home... in your ain country" and the "If it be a boy" stanzas); Vol. 3, No. 2 (Dec 1955), p. 19, contains an "Additional Note" on the song but no additional text)
DT 319, AMBLTOWN
ST LK43A (Full)
Roud #269
RECORDINGS:
Jumbo Brightwell, "The Oak and the Ash" (on Voice02)
BROADSIDES:
NLScotland, RB.m.143(127), "Home, Dearie, Home," Poet's Box (Dundee), unknown (with this chorus, though the nearly-illegible text does not appear to match this song; it appears to be a rewrite of this piece)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Rosemary Lane" [Laws K43]
cf. "A North Country Maid"
SAME TUNE:
Home, Boys, Home (Niles/Moore-SongsMyMotherNeverTaughtMe, pp. 37-38, listed as being to the tune of "The Son of a Gambolier" but appearing to be a parody of this)
ALTERNATE TITLES:
Home, Dearie, Home
Oak and the Ash, The
NOTES [80 words]: For the complex relationship between this song, "A North Country Maid," and "Rosemary Lane" [Laws K43], see the notes to the latter song. - RBW
I put [the Silber text] in with Ambletown rather than Rosemary Lane because the only narrative verses describe the sailor's longing to be "sitting in my parlor and talking to my dear" and thinking of the "pretty little babe that has never seen its daddy." No explicit seduction -- which places it in the Ambletown ambit, so to speak. - PJS
Last updated in version 6.2
File: LK43A

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