Lilly Dale

DESCRIPTION: "'Twas a calm still night and the moon's pale light Shone soft o'er hill and dale, When friends mute with grief" gather around Lilly Dale's deathbed. She asks to be buried near home, by a chestnut tree and stream.
AUTHOR: H. S. Thompson (1852) (source: Thompson-APioneerSongster)
EARLIEST DATE: before 1857 (broadside, Bodleian Firth b.26(374)) [but note derivative song sheet dated 1853, LOCSheet sm1853 591360, "Grave of Lilly Dale"]
KEYWORDS: disease death burial
FOUND IN: US(SW)
REFERENCES (6 citations):
Thompson-APioneerSongster 39, "Lilly Dale" (1 text)
Huntington-TheGam-MoreSongsWhalemenSang, pp. 291-292, "Lily Dale" (1 text, 1 tune)
Wolf-AmericanSongSheets, #1255, p. 86, "Lilly Dale" (1 reference)
Heart-Songs, p. 299, "Lilly Dale" (1 text, 1 tune)
Dime-Song-Book #6, p. 5, "Lilly Dale" (1 text)
Thatcher-ColonialMinstrel-Songsters, p. 179, "Toll the Bell for Lilla Dale" (1 text, from the "Victoria Songster")
Roud #2819
RECORDINGS:
John McCready, "Lily Dale" (on AMMEM/Cowell; recorded 1939)
Asa Martin & Doc Roberts, "Lillie Dale" (American 5-11-63, 1934; on KMM])
BROADSIDES:
Bodleian, Firth b.26(374), "Lilly Da"" ("Twas a calm still night, and the moon's pale light "), H.F. Sefton (Worcester), 1844-1856; also Harding B 11(2674), Harding B 11(3148), Firth b.26(85), Harding B 40(26b), "Lilly Dale"; Harding B 11(938), Harding B 11(2131), "Lily Dale"
LOCSheet, sm1880 08165, "Lilly Dale," Oliver Ditson & Co. (Boston), 1880 (1 text, 1 tune)
LOCSinging, as107750, "Lilly Dale" ("'Twas a calm, still night, and the moon's pale light"), J. Andrews (New York), 1853-1859; also as107740, as107760, sb20280b, "Lilly Dale"
VonWalthour, CD Drive>l>l(37), "Lilly Dale" ("'Twas on a calm still night, and the moon's pale light"), H. De Marsan (New Yorke), 1861-1864
VonWalthour, CD Drive>l>l(38), "Lilly Dale" ("'Twas on a calm still night, and the moon's pale light"), J. Andrews, 1853-1859
VonWalthour, CD Drive>l>l(39), "Lilly Dale" ("'Twas on a calm still night"), Thomas G Doyle (Baltimore), no date
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "The Grave of Lilly Dale" (characters)
SAME TUNE:
Minnie ("When the sun's beaming high o'er the cloudless blue sky") (Wolf-AmericanSongSheets p. 97)
Poor Billy Vail. A Parody on "Lilly Dale" (Wolf-AmericanSongSheets p. 128)
Some Love to Drink, A Popular Temperance Song (Wolf-AmericanSongSheets, p. 145)
NOTES [282 words]: Broadside Bodleian Harding B 11(3148) ends with a verse that begins a different song, "The Grave of Lilly Dale" by Sidney Dyer: "We smoothed down the locks of her soft golden hair, And folded her arms on her breast, And laid her at eve in the valley so fair, 'Mid the blossoms of summer to rest." See
LOCSheet, sm1853 591360, "Grave of Lilly Dale," A. E. Jones and Co. (Indianapolis), 1853 (1 text, 1 tune). Another edition of this is LOCSinging, sb10139b, "The Grave of Lilly Dale" ("We smoothed down the locks of her soft golden hair"), J. Andrews (New York), 1853-1859; also as104830, sb10140a, "The Grave of Lilly Dale"
[For other broadside versions of "The Grave of Lilly Dale," see the list on p. 54 of Edwin Wolf 2nd, American Song Sheets, Slip Ballads, and Political Broadsides 1850-1870, Library Company of Philadelphia, 1963. It can also be found in Dime-Song-Book #2, p. 25 - RBW]
John McCready was recorded in Groveland, California in 1939.
Broadsides LOCSinging as107740 and VonWalthour CDDrive>l>l(37) appear to be the same edition.
Broadsides LOCSinging as107750 and VonWalthour CDDrive>l>l(38) appear to be the same edition.
Broadsides LOCSinging as107760 and VonWalthour CDDrive>l>l(39) appear to be the same edition.
Broadside LOCSinging as107750 and sb10139b (below) and VonWalthour CD Drive>l>l(38): J. Andrews dating per Studying Nineteenth-Century Popular Song by Paul Charosh in American Music, Winter 1997, Vol 15.4, Table 1, available at FindArticles site.
Broadside VonWalthour CD Drive>l>l(37): H. De Marsan dating per Studying Nineteenth-Century Popular Song by Paul Charosh in American Music, Winter 1997, Vol 15.4, Table 1, available at FindArticles site. - BS
Last updated in version 6.6
File: TPS039

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