So join right in and gloat about the War of 1812

[sovay]

Does the U.S. have any songs of the War of 1812? The national anthem doesn't count. I have trouble imagining they weren't written, but I realized a few days ago that the only ones I know are Canadian: Stan Rogers' "MacDonnell on the Heights," Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie's "The White House Burned (The War of 1812)," and now Tanglefoot's "Secord's Warning." Am I just seeing the difference in the war's importance between countries? Was the whole engagement so nationally embarrassing that even the American folk tradition tried to forget about it? In the course of writing this post I remembered "The Hunters of Kentucky," but I believe it owes its prominence to Andrew Jackson using it as a campaign song and I still can't think of anything more recent.¹ Is there a very simple explanation I'm missing because I tapped out of formally taught American history at the end of eighth grade?

[edit] I have been reminded of the existence of Jimmy Driftwood's "The Battle of New Orleans," which I encountered as a child, but had forgotten about completely.

1. And in fact I learned it from the curtain call of Michael Friedman and Alex Timbers' Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson (2010), a musical I cannot honestly recommend listening to right now. Some of the lyrics of "Populism, Yea, Yea!" are a little too on point.

Comments

[movingfinger]

This might be available through ILL.

[sovay]

This might be available through ILL.

Sweet.

I'm still wondering how many of them persisted in the folk tradition, since I know a lot of American folksongs, but I don't know almost any of these.

[the_rck]

Does "The Battle of New Orleans" count? That's still pretty widely performed.

[sovay]

Does "The Battle of New Orleans" count? That's still pretty widely performed.

It sounds like it would! I don't think I know it.

[the_rck]

Here are the lyrics: http://www.louisiana101.com/battle.html

[sovay]

Here are the lyrics

Okay! I heard and/or read the lyrics to this song as a child: I recognize the first and second-to-last verses and the chorus. It's quoted/parodied in the Three Dead Trolls song:

Oh, we fired our guns, but the Yankees kept a-coming
There wasn't quite as many as there was a while ago
We fired once more and the Yankees started running
Down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico

They ran through the snow and they ran through the forest
They ran through the bushes where the beavers wouldn't go
They ran so fast, they forgot to take their culture
Back to America and Gulf and Texaco

I don't own a recording. It had completely skipped my mind. Thank you!

[the_rck]

Judging by Google, it has survived more in the country music tradition than in the folk music tradition.

[sovay]

Judging by Google, it has survived more in the country music tradition than in the folk music tradition.

It is true that I don't know much country music after the first half of the twentieth century, in which it was more like a subgenre of contemporary folk.

[the_rck]

In the first bit of Google results, I saw versions by Johnny Horton, Johnny Cash, and the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.

[kore]

Oh wow, I hadn't thought of the Battle song in a long time -- my dad used to sing it (he knew all the lyrics to every song about up til maybe 1961, I am not even kidding. We called him the jukebox). I think he knew the Johnny Horton version, though.

[sovay]

I think he knew the Johnny Horton version, though.

It is shorter and less sweary.

I've been listening to Jimmie Driftwood since this post turned him up; he turns out to have written, among other things, "He Had a Long Chain On."

[kore]

OMG, I know that from PPM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhM0hAzrl8A

[sovay]

OMG, I know that from PPM

I didn't know they'd sung it! I grew up on Odetta.

[kore]

(Peter Paul and Mary was one of the FEW musical groups from the sixties my parents liked. This included Simon and Garfunkel, and the Mamas and Papas. They did not like any iteration of Bob Dylan. When I got into the Doors and Rolling Stones they were horrified.)

[sovay]

Peter Paul and Mary was one of the FEW musical groups from the sixties my parents liked.

Heh. I think we had a couple of records of theirs, but my parents were definitely more on the Phil Ochs, Bob Dylan, Holy Modal Rounders side of things. Jimi Hendrix. Joan Baez. Pete Seeger. Nina Simone. What I think of as the classics.

[kore]

Oh yeah, my parents liked Joan Baez, Nina Simone, LOVED Billie Holiday. They kind of tolerated Pete Seeger. They did like some Bob Dylan songs, when sung by other people, usually women. I inflicted Joshua Tree-era U2 on them relentlessly.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

The odd thing is we Brits have forgotten about it too. You'd think we'd make a big fuss about burning the White House, but we don't. I guess we were so caught up in the Napoleonic Wars that we never paid much mind to that little dust up across the Atlantic. There are, of course, endless songs about Nelson and Napoleon (the British common folk loved Napoleon) and the field of Waterloo.

[sovay]

I guess we were so caught up in the Napoleonic Wars that we never paid much mind to that little dust up across the Atlantic.

I can see how that happened, but I still think it's a weird historical lacuna for both belligerents to have. I can't even remember how I learned about the Burning of Washington, but I don't think it was in school.

There are, of course, endless songs about Nelson and Napoleon (the British common folk loved Napoleon) and the field of Waterloo.

Right! I didn't even grow up in the UK and I have Napoleonic songs coming out of my ears.

[moon-custafer.livejournal.com]

IIRC, somebody once summed up the Treaty of Ghent as "everything gets put back where it was, and we pretend nothing happened," so that may explain the lack of commemoration among the belligerents.

We in Canada, otoh, can't shut up about it.

[sovay]

IIRC, somebody once summed up the Treaty of Ghent as "everything gets put back where it was, and we pretend nothing happened," so that may explain the lack of commemoration among the belligerents.

Heh. Plus Britain being distracted by the rest of the Napoleonic Wars and I really think the U.S. not wanting to remember that our capital got occupied and burnt down, it makes sense to me.

We in Canada, otoh, can't shut up about it.

What is the especial significance in Canada?

[moon-custafer.livejournal.com]

Mostly we just like being able to boast that we burnt down the White House that one time.

Also, there's a brand of chocolates named after Laura Secord, who actually was fairly heroic -- she and her husband were in territory that got captured and occupied by US troops. Some officers put themselves up in her house, and incautiously discussed their plans in front of her, possibly assuming that her husband (who was still recovering from wounds received in battle) wouldn't be able to do anything about it. Mrs. Second then found an excuse to leave the house for the day, took off through the woods and made her way (with help from some Mohawks) to one Colonel Fitzgibbon, who she warned of the intended attack.

[schreibergasse.livejournal.com]

"The White House Burned" actually adapts some lyrics from an earlier song, "The Battle of New Orleans":

http://www.louisiana101.com/battle.html

[sovay]

"The White House Burned" actually adapts some lyrics from an earlier song, "The Battle of New Orleans"

I was just reminded of that on Dreamwidth! I had heard or at least read it as a child, but it was not in my head at all.

[schreibergasse.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure I remember my father singing it to me at some point.

Actually, I should probably break it out for Peter. The verse with the alligator is always a crowd-pleaser.

[sovay]

I'm pretty sure I remember my father singing it to me at some point.

I associate it with my mother, but not strongly.

Actually, I should probably break it out for Peter. The verse with the alligator is always a crowd-pleaser.

I feel I might have remembered this song much more vividly if I'd known the verse with the alligator!

[ladymondegreen.livejournal.com]

My father used to sing this to me too. Did yours also sing Working on the Railroad?

[sovay]

Did yours also sing Working on the Railroad?

My mother did. My father sang "Hobo's Lullaby" and a song I know only as "Bed is too soft for my tiredness."

Bed is too

[lauradi7.livejournal.com]

I learned it (and sang it) as "Bed is too *small* for my tiredness." When my daughter was little, she referred to it as "The Chin song."

Wasn't there a top 40 version of the Battle of New Orleans? I certainly remember hearing it on the radio.

Hit song

[lauradi7.livejournal.com]

Johnny Horton's version of The Battle was a Billboard #1 hit in 1959, according to the Wikipedia.

Re: Bed is too

[sovay]

I learned it (and sang it) as "Bed is too *small* for my tiredness." When my daughter was little, she referred to it as "The Chin song."

Do you have any idea of its origins? I have only heard my father sing it.

Re: Bed is too

[lauradi7.livejournal.com]

My automatic assumption was that it was a Girl Scout song, because many songs in my childhood were. My mother was a professional GS worker for a while (trained leaders, dealt with bureaucracy) and loved many of the campfire songs. This seems to be confirmed by a quick Duckduckgo search (I tend not to use google) in which "bed is too small" autocompleted to "for my tiredness" first. Some of the hits were Scout or Guide references. That doesn't explain your father. My husband was a Boy Scout, but learned it from me as an adult.

[schreibergasse.livejournal.com]

Forgot to mention: I have a feeling that TBoNO may have been one of those songs that every kid in the 1950s knew, but has now become obscure.
Incidentally, further research suggests that Jimmy Driftwood actually adapted the tune from an old fiddle melody known as "The 8th of January" or "Jackson's Victory". So there may have been songs made up at the time, but they definitely named a tune in honor of it!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Battle_of_New_Orleans

[sovay]

Forgot to mention: I have a feeling that TBoNO may have been one of those songs that every kid in the 1950s knew, but has now become obscure.

That makes sense to me. Although then I don't know why I don't know it when I can sing the theme song of Disney's Davy Crockett.

Incidentally, further research suggests that Jimmy Driftwood actually adapted the tune from an old fiddle melody known as "The 8th of January" or "Jackson's Victory". So there may have been songs made up at the time, but they definitely named a tune in honor of it!

That's cool!

[edit] I hadn't realized that Driftwood wrote "He Had a Long Chain On," recorded most famously and effectively by Odetta. I might have to research him.

[edit edit] Major force in American folk music and preservation of folkways. That's pretty cool.

[ladymondegreen.livejournal.com]

This got buried in one of the tangent emails, but I found a Smithsonian collection that might be of interest here.</>

[sovay]

This got buried in one of the tangent emails, but I found a Smithsonian collection that might be of interest here

I definitely do not know most of those.

[teenybuffalo.livejournal.com]

I was coming here to recommend "The Constitution and the Guerriere" and found that ladymondegreen already covered that in her link. As well as "Perry on Lake Erie," and "James Bird," which are particular favorites of mine since they're about the Western Front, as it were -- the war of ships on the Great Lakes -- and I once served on the ship they both concern, the USS Niagara, currently "rebuilt" from a tiny fraction of the original wood, like the ship in philosophy. (I served for two and a half weeks, and sailed once, and learned almost zilch about sailing, but made some good friends.)

"Perry on Lake Erie" is a heroic praise song about Oliver Hazard Perry, who seems to have been nigh-self-destructively brave as well as having a great name.

"James Bird" is a heartbreaking ballad about the hanging of a war hero who then went home to see his family without leave from the US Navy and was done for desertion. It was written by a local newspaperman and it's got the force and immediacy of fresh reporting, and it's as strong an argument against capital punishment as I've ever heard.

Altogether, yes, I think the US is strong on War of 1812 songs only in areas like sea battles or The Battle Of New Orleans where we had a massive victory.

[sovay]

the war of ships on the Great Lakes -- and I once served on the ship they both concern, the USS Niagara, currently "rebuilt" from a tiny fraction of the original wood, like the ship in philosophy. (I served for two and a half weeks, and sailed once, and learned almost zilch about sailing, but made some good friends.)

That's extremely cool.

Altogether, yes, I think the US is strong on War of 1812 songs only in areas like sea battles or The Battle Of New Orleans where we had a massive victory.

Do you have copies of the three you name? "James Bird" sounds devastating.

[teenybuffalo.livejournal.com]

George Ward, author of "Boatman's Cure," does a great version of "Perry" which he's slightly rewritten and merged with another song. It's on his "All Our Brave Tars," http://mulesong.net/index.html, and I don't have a version handy to send you just the one song, but let me look into that.

I don't know anybody who sings "James Bird" better than I do, so you might just ask me to sing it for you sometime.

(I made a recording called "Buckskin Heroes" years ago, focused on American Naval gazing songs, featuring "James Bird." It was a vanity press project that I was pressured into doing by someone else, and I never put time or energy into selling it, so I have cases of it sitting around my parents' house. I'll bring you a copy after the next time I visit them.)

"Constitution and Guerriere" is here, sung by a group I don't know, but whose Irish accents don't stop them from doing a convincingly chest-thumping job: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N75v8e07Zu8 Contains the most desperate rhymes for "Brandy" imaginable. (I've heard it done to the tune of "The Bonny Lass of Fyvie," too, which I like even better.)

[dvulis.livejournal.com]

Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie (they're actually Canadian) have this cool song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7jlFZhprU4

[ookpik.livejournal.com]

More Tanglefoot: "The Commodore's Compliments." And is "Fire and Guns" the War of 1812 or the Revolutionary War?

[sovay]

More Tanglefoot: "The Commodore's Compliments."

I just got that one from ladymondegreen!

And is "Fire and Guns" the War of 1812 or the Revolutionary War?

I have no idea! I'll listen and get back to you.

[ookpik.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure listening wil help any--little to no internal evidence. I am trying to remember what they said when intro-ing the song in concert; certainly Joe would explain the context of New York loyalists fleeing to Canada.

[sovay]

I am trying to remember what they said when intro-ing the song in concert; certainly Joe would explain the context of New York loyalists fleeing to Canada.

For whatever it's worth, someone at Mudcat thinks 1812.

[klwilliams.livejournal.com]

Chaz was unaware that England had any part of the War of 1812. It's not mentioned at all in British schools. I don't remember much about it from my US school, except that it was mentioned. So I wouldn't be surprised at a lack of songs.

[sovay]

So I wouldn't be surprised at a lack of songs.

I'm sure there are all sorts of world events in which the U.S. was involved that nobody talks or teaches about, but being able to identify one and its absence of folk record is just so weird.