Raftsman's Song

from Alone on the Wide Wide Sea by Craig Edwards

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about

Raftsman’s Song (late 19th century)
Before the advent of trains, rivers were often the easiest means of transport, and in 18th and early 19th century America rivers thronged with rafts, canoes, keelboats and eventually steamboats carrying cargoes and passengers. Mrs. Linnie Johnson of Sparta, Tennessee, whose family ran rafts on the Caney Fork River in the 19th century, recorded this for the Tennessee Folklore Society. She learned it from a former raftsman named John W. Lefever. Mike Seeger recorded a version on his “True Vine” album.

lyrics

All you good people do not know
what we poor raftsmen undergo
although we go to take a ride
most every time there comes a tide

On the thirteenth it began to rain
our hands unto the raft all came
our steersman said, "there'll come a tide,
and down the river we will ride."

Our oars to make and then to swing
we go to work like anything
we worked all night there in the rain
and suffered much from cold and pain

The very next morn we turned her loose
she rode all day just like a goose
the evening tide it was so full
and now for shore we all must pull

Alas, we strived in vain
no nearer to the shore we came
run against a bluff, broke off our oar
and now no chance to get on shore

The wind did howl, the trees did fall
we thought that they would kill us all
some did weep and others pray
but Big Joe White just wished for day

Daylight come, we got on shore
we made some plank and fixed our oar
i went on with them to the end
but i never will go rafting again

credits

from Alone on the Wide Wide Sea, released August 9, 2022

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Craig Edwards New London, Connecticut

I play American roots music, from Appalachian fiddle and banjo tunes to Zydeco accordion. For nearly four decades i worked as a staff musician at Mystic Seaport Museum, demonstrating the use of chanteys, or sailor work songs, aboard the museum's collection of historic ships. I've plumbed the depths of sailor music, from the African American origins of chanteys to world maritime traditions. ... more

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