> Martin Carthy > Songs > Virginny
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Australia / Virginny

[ Roud 1488 ; Master title: Australia ; Ballad Index FaE012 ; VWML GG/1/13/779 ; Mudcat 41994 , 100056 ; trad.]

Martin Carthy recorded the transportation ballad Virginny for his 1976 album Crown of Horn and sang it live at the Folkfestival ’76 Dranouter. He noted:

Charles Gamblin, a helper of the folksong collector George Gardiner, obtained Virginny from a Mrs Goodyear just outside Basingstoke [VWML GG/1/13/779] . Mr Gamblin was considered unreliable as a notator of tunes by some who felt it necessary to double-check his finds, but this one seems to be all right. The song dates from before the American War of Independence when the British Establishment used Virginia and the Carolinas as a dumping ground for their social effluent. Victims served out their sentences in slavery, and, at the end, if they survived, often stayed to work the land for their own benefit. Many subsequently became extremely wealthy. The song seems only to have been collected twice—the other time from the East Anglian singer Bob Hart, in whose mouth the location is Australia.

Ewan MacColl sang Virginia Lags in 1976 on his and Peggy Seeger’s Larrikin album of traditional and contemporary folk music, No Tyme Lyke the Present. He noted:

Not all British settlers went over with The Mayflower. A large number of them went as convicts bound for the first British penal settlements in Virginia. Others went as indentured servants, who served another kind of slavery. The early 18^th century saw the growth of a brisk trade in the sale of white slaves to the American colonies—and it wasn’t only vagrants, paupers and petty criminals who suffered banishment. Some six or seven hundred Scots, taken prisoner at Preston in the Jacobite Rebellion in 1715, were transported to Virginia. The American Revolution put and end to the practice and twenty years were to pass before Britain established its penal settlements in Van Diemen’s Land and Botany Bay.

Geoff Ling sang a later version with the convicts’ destination Australia to Keith Summers in January 1971. Another recording made by John Howson was released in 1987-9 on the Veteran Tapes cassette Songs Sung in Suffolk Vol 3 and in 2000 on the Veteran CD Songs Sung in Suffolk. John Howson noted:

Australia was used as a place of transportation from 1787 until the eventual abolition of the practice in 1868. It was a recurrent theme of songs written during this time, and many of them, such as Van Diemen’s Land, have survived in oral circulation. Versions of Australia have been passed from singer to singer in the Blaxhall area. There are recordings of Cyril Poacher and Bob Hart singing it. The song derives from an earlier one about transportation to Virginia, U.S.A. Geoff learned his version from his grandfather, Aaron Ling.

Rod Stradling sang Australia in 1971 on Oak’s album Welcome to Our Fair; this was included in 2003 on their Musical Traditions 2 CD set, Country Songs and Music. He noted in the latter’s booklet:

Rod learned this from Bob Hart; he and his neighbour Cyril Poacher both had this song. Cyril learned it from Bob Scarce, who probably learned it, as did Hart, from Walter “Yinka” Friend—with whom both had worked for many years in Snape Maltings; he was said to have been the first person in the area to have sung it.

It is one of a considerable number of transportation songs in the traditional repertoire, but is unusual in the nature and motive of the crime—highway robbery, “to keep her like a lady”; more often it’s poaching, brought about by necessity. Also, and contrary to certain record sleeve-notes, the song owes little to Van Diemen’s Land, but is clearly derived from a much earlier song called Virginny (a fragment of which was collected from Mrs Goodyear, of Axford, Hants, by George Gardiner in 1907), with the transport’s destination having been changed to Australia when this became current (i.e. post “First Fleet”). This explains why the song is unusual; in the 18^th century highwaymen were transported to Virginia—in the 19^th they were topped!

The process of keeping songs up-to-date goes on—there is a version on tape where Cyril Poacher sings the second stanza of the first verse:

For when I was a young man, my age seventeen,
I ought to been serving Elizabeth, our Queen …

Bob Hart sang Australia on his 1973 LP Songs From Suffolk; this recording was also included on Topic’s 1996 anthology celebrating English traditional music, Hidden English. A.L. Lloyd noted on the original album:

Transportation to Australia was a popular theme for sentimental balladry throughout the first half of the nineteenth century. Like most of the convicts, most of the songs came rather from the towns than the countryside. So with this one, by the sound of it. Though probably widely sung in the past, the song has dwindled almost out of sight and earshot now, and as far as I know, Bob’s is the unique version, unreported elsewhere. It has acquired a verse from Van Diemen’s Land (The farmers they stand with their whips in their hand / They yoke us like horses to plough up their land.)

Cyril Poacher sang Australia in a 1974 home recording by Tony Engle and Keith Summers on his Topic album of traditional songs from Suffolk, The Broomfield Wager and on his 2004 Musical Traditions CD Plenty of Thyme.

Steeleye Span lost the first verse in their recording of Australia on their 1998 CD Horkstow Grange. Bob Johnson noted:

Initially, people were sent there as a punishment. Later, in the 1950’s, families were offered financial assistance to go there and settle. Now, it is a heavily advertised holiday destination, a mere day’s flight from Luton airport to the Barrier Reef. This song is dedicated to Nigel Pegrum, our ex-drummer, who “fell in with a damsel” and now lives there.

Bob Fox sang Virgina in 2003 on his Topic album Borrowed Moments. He noted:

Transportation to Australia or Van Diemen’s Land (now Tasmania) for criminal activity is a well-known and documented piece of our history, Virginia tells of a different destination and a convicted highwayman’s thoughts on his fate. I compiled this version from many verses received down the phone from Martin Carthy who recorded the song in a shorter form on his album Crown of Horn and to whom I am eternally grateful. I have incorporated a fairly jolly mazurka written and played by my great friend Norman Holmes called The White House to represent this convict’s dreams of happier times at home.

Chris Foster sang Australia in 2004 on his CD Jewels.

Pete Castle sang Viginia on his 2006 CD Poor Old Horse. He noted:

Songs about the transportation of convicts to Australia (Van Diemen’s Land or Botany Bay) are very common but this early one from the time when the new colony of Virginia was still used for that purpose is much rarer. I learned it before I went to Washington DC as a representative of Kent in the Roots of Virginia programme of the Smithsonian Folklife Festival 2007. The use of ‘lag’ as a verb is interesting, it only survives now as a noun…

Tim van Eyken sang Australia in 2006 on his Topic CD Stiffs Lovers Holymen Thieves.

Andy Turner sang Australia as the 2 October 2011 entry of his project A Folk Song a Week. He commented in his blog:

This is a song from the Suffolk singer, Bob Hart. I learned it from Roy Palmer’s book, Everyman’s Book of English Country Songs, although I subsequently heard it on the Topic LP Songs From Suffolk.

A different recording can be heard on Musical Traditions MTCD301 Bob Hart: A Broadside.

It is clearly a later rewrite of the song Virginny which Martin Carthy recorded on his album Crown of Horn but the change of destination lacks some historical accuracy. As Rod Stradling explains in his notes to the Musical Traditions CD, most transportation songs concern poaching rather than highway robbery; for the simple reason that in the eighteenth century highwaymen were transported to Virginia, while in the nineteenth century the punishment was hanging.

Sam Lee sang Goodbye My Darling in 2012 on his CD Ground of Its Own.

The Rails sang Australia as the title track of their 2015 EP Australia.

Jim Moray sang Australia on his 2019 CD The Outlander. He noted:

I first heard this sung by Chris Foster on his album Jewels, and later went back to Bob Hart’s recording on Songs From Suffolk.

George Sansome sang Australia in 2020 on his eponymous album George Sansome. He noted:

This song of convict transportation comes from the singing of Bob Hart (1892-1978) from Snape, Suffolk, as recorded by Tony Engle in September 1973.

It has its origins in the earlier song Virginny, which dates to the 18^th century (pre-American Independence) when British convicts were transported to Virginia. After the American Revolutionary War, the British government began to ship convicts to Australia instead, with over 160,000 convicts transported across an 80 year period. Even the convicts who hadn’t been transported for life—perhaps like this song’s narrator—rarely made it back to Britain; few of those with seven or fourteen year sentences could afford the return fare.

Lyrics

Martin Carthy sings Virginny

Now come all you young fellers where’er you may be
Come listen a while and I’ll tell you
It’s many’s the young man myself I have seen
More fitting to serve than to die on a string
But how odd were the judges, how cruel they have been
For to send us poor lads to Virginny

Now when we come to Virginny, that cold shameful place,
Which now I recall in my story
Our captain did stand with his whip and his cane
To bargain for us poor souls out of hand
Like horses they yoked us that had ploughed the salt main
How hard was my fate in Virginny

O England, sweet England, I fear I’ll never see you more
And if I do, it’s ten thousand to twenty
For me fingers they are rotting and me bones they are sore
I wonder about I’m right down to death’s door
But if I can just live to see seven years’ more
I will soon bid farewell to Virginny

Geoff Ling sings Australia

When I was a young man and about seventeen,
I was all ready to fight for Victoria, our Queen,
But to keep her like a lady I went on that highway,
And for that I was sent to Australia.

Australia, Australia, how we worked in that land,
They drove us like horses to plough up their land.
You should have seen us poor fellows, oh, how cruel were they,
How hard is our fate in Australia.

Australia, Australia, I shall ne’er see no more,
I met up with fever, brought down to death’s
But if ever I should live to see seven years more,
I will bid adieu to Australia.

Oak sing Australia

Come all you young fellows wheresome’er you may be,
Come listen awhile to my story.
For when I was a young man, my age seventeen,
I ought to be serving Victoria, our Queen.
But those hard-hearted judges, oh, how cruel they be
To send us poor young lads to Australia.

I fell in with a damsel, she was handsome and gay,
I neglected my work more and more every day,
And to keep her like a lady I went on the highway,
And for that I was sent to Australia.

Where the judges, they stand with their whips in their hands,
They drive us like horses to plough up the land.
You should see us poor young fellows, working in the gaol-yard,
Oh, how hard is the life in Australia.

Australia, Australia, I would ne’er see thee more,
I’m worn out with fever, cast down to Death’s door,
But if I live to see, say, seven years more,
I would then bid adieu to Australia,
I would then bid adieu to Australia.

Bob Hart sing Australia

Come all you young fellows, whereso’er you may be
Come listen a while to my story.
When I was a young man, my age seventeen,
I ought to been serving Victoria, our Queen.
But those hard-hearted judges, oh, how cruel they be
To send us poor lads to Australia.

I fell in with a damsel, she was handsome and gay,
I neglected me work, more and more, every day.
And to keep her like a lady I went on the highway,
And for that I was sent to Australia.

Now the judges, they stand with their whips in their hands,
They drive us, like horses, to plough up the land.
You should see us poor young fellows working in that jail yard;
How hard is our fate in Australia.

Australia, Australia, I would ne’er see no more,
I’m worn out with fever, cast down to Death’s door.
But should I live to see, say, seven years more,
I would then bid adieu to Australia.

Steeleye Span sing Australia

I fell in with a damsel, she was handsome and gay,
I neglected my work more and more every day,
And to keep her like a lady, I went on the highway,
And for that I was sent to Australia.

Chorus:
Australia, Australia, I would ne’er see no more
Worn out with the fever, cast down to Death’s door,
And if I ever live, say, seven years more,
I would soon bid adieu to Australia.

Now the judges, they stand with their whips in their hands
And they drive us like horses to plough up the land.
You should see us poor young fellows, a-working in the gaol-yard,
How cruel is our fate in Australia.

Acknowledgements

Martin Carthy’s version was transcribed by Garry Gillard.