Haul Away, Joe

DESCRIPTION: Shanty, characterized by, "Away, haul away, haul away, Joe" (or "...haul away, pull"). Some versions tell a story: the sailor has trouble with his Irish girl and goes to sea, or suffers grief from a Yankee girl, or otherwise suffers at women's hands
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1917 (what appears to have been a fragment of the chorus appears in the diary of Mary Bray, probably in 1859; see A. A. Hoehling _Ships that Changed History_, p. 18)
KEYWORDS: shanty sailor courting
FOUND IN: US(MA,MW,NE,SE) Ireland
REFERENCES (21 citations):
Doerflinger-SongsOfTheSailorAndLumberman, pp. 4-5, "Haul Away, Joe" (2 texts, 1 tune)
Walton/Grimm-Windjammers-SongsOfTheGreatLakesSailors, pp. 76-78, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 composite text, 1 tune)
Colcord-SongsOfAmericanSailormen, pp. 41-42, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text, 1 tune)
Harlow-ChantyingAboardAmericanShips, pp. 75-78, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text, 1 tune)
Hugill-ShantiesFromTheSevenSeas, pp. 358-361, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text plus several fragments, 3 tunes) [AbEd, pp. 270-272]
Sharp-EnglishFolkChanteys, XXVII, p. 32, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text, 1 tune)
Linscott-FolkSongsOfOldNewEngland, pp. 138-139, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text, 1 tune)
Brown/Schinhan-FrankCBrownCollectionNCFolklore5 780, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 short text, 1 tune)
Terry-TheShantyBook-Part1, #28, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text, 1 tune)
Kinsey-SongsOfTheSea, pp. 93-94, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text, 1 tune)
Lomax/Lomax-OurSingingCountry, pp. 208-209, "Haul Away, My Rosy" (1 text, 1 tune)
Shay-AmericanSeaSongsAndChanteys, p. 30, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text plus some loose verses, 1 tune)
Warner-FolkSongsAndBalladsOfTheEasternSeaboard, p 36, "Haul Away Joe" (1 text)
Kane-SongsAndSayingsOfAnUlsterChildhood, p. 127, "Oh once I loved an Irish girl but she was fat and lazy" (1 text)
Fireside-Book-of-Folk-Songs, p. 145, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text, 1 tune)
Silber/Silber-FolksingersWordbook, p. 87, "Haul Away Joe" (1 text)
DT, HAULJOE*
ADDITIONAL: Captain John Robinson, "Songs of the Chantey Man," a series published July-August 1917 in the periodical _The Bellman_ (Minneapolis, MN, 1906-1919). "Dance the Boatman Dance" is in Part 1, 7/14/1917. "Haul Away, Joe" is in Part 2, 7/21/1917.
Frederick Pease Harlow, _The Making of a Sailor, or Sea Life Aboard a Yankee Square-Rigger_, 1928; republished by Dover, 1988, pp. 272-273, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roger deV. Renwick, _Recentering Anglo/American Folksong: Sea Crabs and Wicked Youths_, University Press of Mississippi, 2001, pp. 87-88, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text)
Moses Asch and Alan Lomax, Editors, _The Leadbelly Songbook_, Oak, 1962, p. 77, "Haul Away, Joe" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud #809
RECORDINGS:
Almanac Singers, "Haul Away, Joe" (General 5015B, 1941; on Almanac02, Almanac03, AlmanacCD1)
Bob Roberts, "Haul Away Joe" (on LastDays)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Haul Away, Old Fellow, Away" (similar chorus)
NOTES [193 words]: To haul, in nautical terminology, of course means to pull on a rope. "Haul away," according to the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, A Seaman's Pocket Book, London, June 1943, designed for sailors newly taken into the Royal Navy in World War II; (I use the 2006 MJF Books edition), p. 42, is "an order to haul steadily until further orders."
The Silber text has a verse (also in Shay) "King Louis was the King of France Before the revolution... But then he got his head cut off Which spoiled his constitution."
I have to suspect this is some wag's addition, but it is worth noting that Louis XVI's France did not have a constitution. (If it had, Louis might have survived the revolution.) Louis (1754-1793) became king in 1774, was reduced to figurehead status by the Revolution in 1789 and failed in an escape attempt in 1791 (even though still theoretical head of state!). In 1792, with a Prussian invasion in progress, the Republic was proclaimed (though never properly constituted), and Louis was put on trial. He was guillotined on January 20, 1793. - RBW
Bob Roberts also sang the "King Louis" verse. It's in tFireside-Book-of-Folk-Songs, too. - PJS
Last updated in version 6.5
File: Doe004

Go to the Ballad Search form
Go to the Ballad Index Song List

Go to the Ballad Index Instructions
Go to the Ballad Index Bibliography or Discography