Sea Captain and the Squire, The [Laws Q12]

DESCRIPTION: The captain leaves his new bride to be seduced by a squire. The night the captain returns, all the women of the house give birth. The wife explains her state (the male servants had impregnated the maids); her captain forgives her (!) "for the joke's sake"
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1905 (Reeves/Sharp-TheIdiomOfThePeople)
KEYWORDS: seduction pregnancy separation adultery
FOUND IN: US(Ap,NE) Britain(Scotland(Aber),England(South)) Ireland
REFERENCES (7 citations):
Laws Q12, "The Sea Captain and the Squire"
Greig/Duncan7 1502, "The Blanket Curant" (5 texts, 2 tunes)
Reeves/Sharp-TheIdiomOfThePeople 89, "The Sea Captain" (1 text)
Graham-Joe-Holmes-SongsMusicTraditionsOfAnUlsterman 65, "The Roving Sea Captain" (1 text, 1 tune)
Combs/Wilgus-FolkSongsOfTheSouthernUnitedStates 121, pp. 138-140, "There Was a Sea Captain" (1 text)
Lane/Gosbee-SongsOfShipsAndSailors, pp. 66-67, "The Captain and the Squire" (1 text, 1 tune)
DT 734, SEACAPT SEACAPT2
Roud #947
BROADSIDES:
NLScotland, APS.4.86.3, "The Sea Captain," unknown, after 1820
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "A War Bird's Burlesque" (plot)
NOTES [52 words]: In the NLScotland broadside the returned Captain explains that on the night of her indiscretion he had a "jovial" time at the corrant [dance] and that, when in the West Indies, "I met with a lady her beauty shone clear, I asked her the question she did not deny it, And for the same favour I gave her a boy." - BS
Last updated in version 6.4
File: LQ12

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