The Banks of Green Willow

Go and get your father's good will,
and get your mother's money,
and sail right o'er the ocean
along with your Johnny

She had been not been a-sailing
been sailing many days, O,
before she want some woman's help
and could not get any

Oh fetch me a silk napkin
to tie her head up so easy,
and I'll throw her overboard
both she and her baby

Oh they fetched him a napkin
and they bound her head so easy,
and overboard he threw his love,
both she and her baby

See how my love do tumble,
see how my love to taver,
see how my love do try to swim,
that makes my heart quaver

Oh, make my love a coffin
of the gold that shines yellow,
and she shall be buried
by the banks of green willow (sung by Mrs Overd; Langport, Somerset)

Take some time to read these words over and explain to yourself (or those around you) what is happening in the story. Until recently it has never fully made sense to me, my original thoughts being; The lady in the song is obviously pregnant which is why she asks for a woman's help but the sailor's subsequent reactions after and incongruous to say the least, first tying up her head with a tissue, then throwing her overboard and finally lamenting her death and building her a solid gold coffin: inconsistency just doesn't cover this guy!

Collected in this format in 1904, The banks of green willow was originally recorded in 1882 as Child ballad no.24 "Bonnie Annie" or "The High Banks O Yarrow". The original versions go into far more depth about the circumstances that surround the woman's untimely death and reveal a Jonah-esque tale of tragedy and nautical superstition where the ship cannot continue its journey due to having a wrongdoer on board; indeed, in his notes in "English Folk Songs", Vaughn Williams comments that these superstitions actually predate the story of Jonah however, this meaning has somewhat been lost with the distortion of twentieth century versions. This post will look more closely at the story that is missing from the later version.

First off: what has this woman done wrong? Well for a start she's a woman at sea (but not a naked one); second she's pregnant without being married (inferring an act of a christian god) and third she has stolen her parents gold to fund the trip, reason enough it seems!

I mention the second reason with a certain level of scepticism partly because of Vaughn Williams' notes above but also because of a point that appears in Child's research on the song Bonny Annie: In this song, which Child suggests may be the original, it is the casting of "black bullets" (ballots?) that dictates the lady's death and as Child points out, this "strikes us as having more semblance of the 'corrupted currents of the world' than of a pure judgement of god". If this is the case then the whole message of the song is quite radically changed from a superstitious warning to a comment on the very superstitions that influence the sailor's actions, leading to questions of rigging.

The next gap in the story that has a notable effect on the way that the songs scan is the way that the captain (or rich squire) reacts to the choice of his sweetheart as the sacrifice. He offers the crew great sums of money to keep trying through the storm but to no avail, they tell him that they will not help him at risk of their crew. As a side note, when the paramour throws the lady overboard (or she jumps), she is said to taver; this could well be made up word which just rhymes with quaver but I feel still induces enough meaning that I'm going to start using it in everyday language (I'm taking it to mean flail and tumble)

So it appears that our story is coming together with loose threads being tied up; the reason for the woman being tipped over board is more clearly explained and thus the sailor's subsequent lamentation is more inkeeping with events. This is a song full of passion and despair that time and corruption has almost masked from sight.

One final thing to note about the song is that the most common tune that the words are sung to is a composition by Butterworth entitled The Banks of Green Willow written in 1913 and there seem to be no tunes to any of the versions of the song that come earlier than the twentieth century.

Notable versions of the song can be found on these abums:

Jackie Oates: Jackie Oates (2006)
Spiers & Boden: Through and Through (2001)
Nic Jones: Nic Jones (1971)

For my version of the song, I have written a tune called "Just one more minute" which I will upload just as soon as I have notated it down!