Jolly Wagoner, The

DESCRIPTION: "When first I went a-wagonin', a-wagonin' I did go, I filled my parents' hearts full of sorrow, grief and woe." The singer recalls being rained on, seeing birds in summer, driving hard roads in the winter. He rejoices to reach home and wife
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1847 (Dixon)
KEYWORDS: home travel wife hardtimes
FOUND IN: Britain(England(All))
REFERENCES (9 citations):
Gardham-EarliestVersions, "JOLLY WAGGONER, THE"
Bell-Combined-EarlyBallads-CustomsBalladsSongsPeasantryEngland, pp. 428-4229, "The Jolly Waggoner" (1 text)
Williams-FolkSongsOfTheUpperThames, p. 157, "The Jolly Waggoner" (1 text) (also Williams-Wiltshire-WSRO Wt 454)
Kennedy-FolksongsOfBritainAndIreland 230, "The Jolly Waggoner" (1 text, 1 tune)
OShaughnessy-YellowbellyBalladsPart1 27, "The Jolly Waggoner" (1 text, 1 tune)
Pamer-ECS, #16, "The Jolly Waggoner" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud/Bishop-NewPenguinBookOfEnglishFolkSongs #98, "The Jolly Waggoner" (1 text, 1 tune)
Shoemaker-MountainMinstrelsyOfPennsylvania, pp. 309-310, "The Jolly Waggoner" (1 text)
ADDITIONAL: Robert Bell, editor, Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of the Peasantry of England (London, 1857 ("Digitized by Google)), pp. 208-209, "The Jolly Waggoner" (1 text)
Roud #1088
NOTES [118 words]: Kennedy-FolksongsOfBritainAndIreland lists a number of earlier versions of this song -- but much of his text is floating-type material, and he is known to lump completely unrelated songs. So I have not listed any of the versions in his bibliography; most are probably this piece, but chances are that at least a few are not. And I don't know which. - RBW
The Williams-FolkSongsOfTheUpperThames text is, with very minor changes, the same as Bell's text.
Kennedy reports this in both James Henry Dixon, Ancient Poems, Ballads, and Songs of the Peasantry of England (London, 1846) and Bell (1857). I don't find it in Dixon; if I'm right rather than just sloppy, Bell found this and did not crib it from Dixon. - BS
Last updated in version 6.8
File: K230

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