Yellow Meal (Heave Away; Yellow Gals; Tapscott; Bound to Go)

DESCRIPTION: The Irish adventurer comes to Mr. Tapscott, seeking passage to America. Tapscott arranges for (his) voyage, (charging an exorbitant price and) leaving the young Irishman to be plundered on the voyage. The youth vows to stay on the American shore
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1870
KEYWORDS: sailor emigration robbery
FOUND IN: US(MA,NE) Ireland Canada(Mar)
REFERENCES (14 citations):
Doerflinger-SongsOfTheSailorAndLumberman, pp. 61-64, "Heave Away" (3 texts, 1 tune, but the last is "Heave Away, Me Johnnies")
Shay-AmericanSeaSongsAndChanteys, pp. 73-74, "We're All Bound to Go" (1 text)
Hugill-ShantiesFromTheSevenSeas, pp. 298-301, "Lay Me Down," "Across the Western Ocean," "The Irish Emigrant", "Heave Away" (4 texts, 2 tunes) [AbEd, pp. 222-224]
Beck-FolkloreOfMaine, pp. 182-183, "Tab Scott" (1 text)
O'Conor-OldTimeSongsAndBalladOfIreland, p. 56, "Yellow Meal" (1 text)
Sandburg-TheAmericanSongbag, p. 407, "Heave Away" (1 text, 1 tune -- a fragment of a shanty which could go here, or with "Heave Away, Me Johnnies," or perhaps somewhere else)
Henry/Huntingdon/Herrmann-SamHenrysSongsOfThePeople H827, pp. 100-101, "Yellow Meal" (1 text, 1 tune)
Mackenzie-BalladsAndSeaSongsFromNovaScotia 98, "We're All Away to Sea" (1 text)
Terry-TheShantyBook-Part1, #13, "We're All Bound to Go" (1 text, 1 tune)
Kinsey-SongsOfTheSea, pp. 75-76, "We're All Bound to Go" (1 text, 1 tune)
Lomax/Lomax-AmericanBalladsAndFolkSongs, pp. 485-486, "Heave Away" (1 fragmentary text, recognized by the chorus line and perhaps only slightly related, 1 tune)
Darling-NewAmericanSongster, p. 325, "Heave Away" (1 text -- a fragment of a shanty which could go here, or with "Heave Away, Me Johnnies," or perhaps somewhere else)
DT, YELLMEAL*
ADDITIONAL: Frederick Pease Harlow, _The Making of a Sailor, or Sea Life Aboard a Yankee Square-Rigger_, 1928; republished by Dover, 1988, p. 104, "Heave Away Me Johnnies" (1 text)
Roud #15778
RECORDINGS:
Richard Maitland, "Heave Away" (AFS, 1939; on LC26)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Heave Away, Me Johnnies" (tune, meter, chorus)
cf. "Down in the Coal Mine" (part of tune)
cf. "Yellow Gals (Doodle Let Me Go)" (lyrics)
NOTES [232 words]: The brothers William and James Tapscott (the former based in Britain and the latter in New York) ran a business arranging passage from Britain to America. (Often this involved shipping a girl from Ireland to meet her love, who had already gone to America.) As their clients were often completely ignorant, they frequently were able to make a very tidy profit indeed.
The "Yellow Meal" (pronounced "Yellow Male") versions of the text seem to have been adapted from a stage version.
Sam Henry has circumstantial details of the voyage of the Joshua A. Walker, mentioned in his text. Many versions, however, omit references to this ship. In Harlow's text, the ship is the Josie Walker, and he reports on p. 105 of The Making of a Sailor that "Tapscott, in the foregoing chantey, in the early fifties was one of the wealthy shipowners of Liverpool. His vesels were noted for strict discipline, as well as cruelty to the crew. His Josie Walker was an emigrant ship trading between Liverpool and New York and her voyages, to and from the Continent, were marked by unheard-of cruelties, the stories of which spread along the water front and the ship was known to all sailors as 'Tapscott's Josie Walker.' The mention of this 'hell ship' stopped many a good sailor from shipping in her and being unable to secure a good crew was the cause no doubt of the many perversities to a green crew." - RBW
Last updated in version 5.1
File: Doe062

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