When I Was Young (Don't Never Trust a Sailor)

DESCRIPTION: A girl laments the loss of her virginity to a sailor, (who gives her half a dollar for "the damage I have done," and advises if she has a son to send him off to sea). She is found to be pregnant. Her parents throw her out. She warns girls against sailors
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1929 (Greenleaf/Mansfield-BalladsAndSeaSongsOfNewfoundland)
KEYWORDS: bawdy sailor seduction sex warning
FOUND IN: US(MW,So,SW) Canada(Newf)
REFERENCES (10 citations):
Cray-EroticMuse, pp. 75-78, "When I Was Young" (2 texts, 1 tune)
Randolph 806, "Don't Never Trust a Sailor" (1 text)
Randolph/Legman-RollMeInYourArms I, pp. 74-80, "When I Was Young and Foolish" (2 texts, 2 tunes)
Greenleaf/Mansfield-BalladsAndSeaSongsOfNewfoundland 58, "The Lass that Loved a Sailor" (1 text, 1 tune)
Hugill-ShantiesFromTheSevenSeas, pp. 500-501, "Home, Home, Home" (1 text, 1 tune, with a chorus probably derived from "Ambletown" or some other member of the "Rosemary Lane" family) [AbEd, pp. 368-369]
Johnson-BawdyBalladsAndLustyLyrics, p. 65, "The Lass That Loved a Sailor" (1 text)
Sandburg-TheAmericanSongbag, p. 219, "When I Was Young and Foolish" (1 short text, 1 tune, which appears to go with this piece although the ending is missing)
Blondahl-NewfoundlandersSing, p. 106, "The Lass That Loved a Sailor" (1 text, 1 tune)
Palmer-SongsOfTheMidlands, p. 25, "Young Sailor Bold" (1 text, 1 tune)
Morgan/Green-RugbySongs, pp. 41-43, "Once There Was a Servant Girl Whose Name Was Mary Jane" (1 text, which appears to have been made even more bawdy than the original song, so it might perhaps be a very crude rewrite of "Rosemary Lane" rather than this piece)
ST EM075 (Full)
Roud #954
RECORDINGS:
Dillard Chandler, "The Sailor Being Tired" (on OldLove, DarkHoll)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Rosemary Lane" [Laws K43]
cf. "The Gatesville Cannonball"
cf. "Oh, No, Not I" (floating lyrics)
cf. "Rambleaway" (plot)
ALTERNATE TITLES:
The Night Hawk
The Sailor-Girl's Lament
NOTES [85 words]: Randolph/Legman-RollMeInYourArms has extensive historical notes, separating this "inch-above-the-knee" song from "Bell Bottom Trousers/Rosemary Lane." - EC
For discussion of this song and its ancestry, see the entry on "Rosemary Lane" [Laws K43]. The pieces here may not be a unity; one might describe this as bawdy remnants of that ballad.
Roud lists some of the versions listed here as his #269, i.e. "Rosemary Lane." It can be hard to tell with a short version such as that in Palmer-SongsOfTheMidlands. - RBW
Last updated in version 6.7
File: EM075

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