Come All You Fair and Tender Girls

DESCRIPTION: Willie courts the narrator, asks her to go with him. She consents, but when they are far from home, he sends her back, saying it's his nature to ramble
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1908 (collected by Olive Dame Campbell, in Sharp-EnglishFolkSongsFromSouthernAppalachians)
KEYWORDS: courting elopement abandonment
FOUND IN: US(Ap,SE)
REFERENCES (4 citations):
Sharp-EnglishFolkSongsFromSouthernAppalachians 103, "Come All You Young and Handsome Girls" (1 text, 1 tune)
Scarborough-ASongCatcherInSouthernMountains, pp. 321-326, "Come All You Fair and Handsome Girls" (5 texts, with local titles "Come All You Fair and Handsome Girls," (no title), "Fair and Handsome Girls," "Fair and Handsome Girls," (no title); the "E" text appears likely to be some other song, of the vast "Rye Whiskey/Wagoner's Lad" type; 1 tune on p. 442)
Wyman/Brockway-LonesomeSongs-KentuckyMountains-Vol2, p. 80, "Come All You Young and Handsome Girls" (1 text, 1 tune)
Cohen/Seeger/Wood-NewLostCityRamblersSongbook, p. 49, "Sweet Willie" (1 text, 1 tune)
ST WB2080 (Partial)
Roud #3606
RECORDINGS:
Banjo Bill Cornett, "Sweet Willie" (on MMOK, MMOKCD)
Green Maggard, "Come All You Fair and Handsome Girls" (AFS, 1934; on KMM)
Doug Wallin, "Little Willie" (on FarMtns3)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "The Fair Flower of Northumberland" [Child 9] (plot)
cf. "Fair and Tender Ladies" (lyrics)
NOTES [37 words]: Is it possible this is a ballad from which "Fair and Tender Ladies" has descended, with the narrative removed? It has warning verses at the beginning, although not those normally associated with "Fair and Tender Ladies." -PJS
Last updated in version 4.3
File: WB2080

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