Emmet's Farewell to His Sweetheart

DESCRIPTION: "Farewell, love, farewell, love, I now must leave you." Emmet declares he has never deceived her. "Oh, never in the moonlight we'll roam, love." He asks her to promise to "come to my grave when all others forsake me." He hears "the death token."
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: before 1900 (broadside, Bodleian Harding B 40(3))
KEYWORDS: love farewell execution
HISTORICAL REFERENCES:
Sep 20, 1803 - Robert Emmet (1778-1803) is hanged
FOUND IN: Ireland
REFERENCES (4 citations):
O'Conor-OldTimeSongsAndBalladOfIreland, p. 109, "Emmet's Farewell to His Sweetheart" (1 text)
Moylan-TheAgeOfRevolution-1776-1815 160, "Emmet's Farewell" (1 text, 1 tune)
Munnelly/Deasy-TheMountCallanGarland-Tom-Lenihan 22, "Emmet's Farewell" (1 text, 1 tune)
Hylands-Mammoth-Hibernian-Songster, p. 102, "Emmet's Farewell to His Love" (1 text)
Roud #5224
BROADSIDES:
Bodleian, Harding B 40(3), "Emmet's Farewell To His Love", J.F. Nugent and Co.? (Dublin?), 1850-1899
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Bold Robert Emmet" (subject) and references there
cf. "She Is Far from the Land" (subject of Robert Emmet and Sarah Curran)
ALTERNATE TITLES:
Robert Emmet's Farewell to Sarah Curran
NOTES [93 words]: For the sad background of this typically Irish story, see the notes to "Bold Robert Emmet."
Robert Kee, in The Most Distressful Country (being volume I of The Green Flag), p. 169, reports that Emmet's girlfriend was Sarah Curran, daughter of the lawyer John Philpot Curran (1750-1817). Curran had defended the 1798 conspirators at their trials, and opposed the Act of Union -- but his daughter had gone farther, writing letters to Emmet which supported rebellion. Her father disowned her.
For more on Curran, see the notes to "She is Far From the Land." - RBW
Last updated in version 6.1
File: OCon109

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