Sailors' Wives, The

DESCRIPTION: "The first one was the gunner's wife and she was dressed in green, And in one corner of her had she stowed the magazine." Other (sailors') wives also come forward in their colors and show what the have accommodated in their "clothing"
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1971 (Folk Songs of Today, according to Palmer)
KEYWORDS: bawdy wordplay sailor clothes colors
FOUND IN: Britain(England(South))
REFERENCES (4 citations):
Palmer-OxfordBookOfSeaSongs 147, "The Sailors's Wives" (1 text, 1 tune)
Tawney-GreyFunnelLines-RoyalNavy, pp. 56-60, "Four Girls of Plymouth Town"; "Sailors' Wives"; "The Captain's Ball" (3 texts, with a tune for "Sailors' Wives" on p. 151)
Page-ForGawdsakeDontTakeMe, pp. 101-102, "The Army Dance" (1 text, tune referenced)
Palmer-WhatALovelyWar, p. 158, "The Army Dance" (1 text, tune referenced)
Roud #5666
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Four Old Whores" (theme of comparison of body parts)
NOTES [109 words]: Roud lumps this with the "Four Old Whores" family and apparently with "The North Atlantic Squadron." The theme is obviously the same, but the format is so different that I cannot consider them the same song. One may have inspired the other, but whichever one is secondary was clearly created from the ground up. As it were.
Navy and Army versions also differ, but since they're both about the wives of various personnel, I think they can be lumped.
Page-ForGawdsakeDontTakeMe lists the tune of this as "Come, Comrades, Fill the Flowing Bowl." I assume this is "Landlord, Fill the Flowing Bowl." That is also the tune listed by Palmer-WhatALovelyWar. - RBW
Last updated in version 7.2
File: PaSe147

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