The Greenwood Side
A Lighthearted Tune from Much Darker Balled
The Greenwood Side
The ‘Greenwood Side,’ as a 2/4 march, belongs to the 1st Battalion Right Flank company of the Scots Guard. Most of its members past and present are most likely no strangers to the darker aspects of life. Although the topic of their companies march may still shock some; infanticide.
The song in question has gone by several different names over the centuries; ‘The Cruel Mother,’ ‘The Minister’s Daughter of New York,’ and a particular favorite version of mine performed by Bill Livingston known as ‘A Thousand Curses On Love…’ As the above titles may reveal, and which is confirmed by Ewan MacColl in the liner notes of his recording of the tune: “The Cruel Mother (Child #20) is well known in England, Ireland, America and Scotland, the best texts and tunes coming from the latter. Its tale of infanticide is a familiar one throughout northern Europe…” MacColl learned the tune from a 74 year old Perthshire singer, Margaret Logan, in Corsham, Wiltshire, in 1953. The tune in question could be found as far afield as the Ozark Highlands.
The details vary across versions but the tale remains much the same. A woman gives birth to one or more children. Then facing the applied shame of revealing her past indiscretions chooses instead to end their short lives. The changing details of the story reveal come threads throughout the folk song tradition of Scotland and beyond. And perhaps a little more insight into ancient origins of the theme found within.
The Cruel Mother as sung by Ewan MacColl:
A minister’s dochter in the North,
Hey, the rose and the linsie, O.
She’s fa’en in love w i’ her faither’s clerk,
Doon by the greenwood sidie, O.
She’s coorted him a year and a day.
Till her the young man did betray.
She leaned her back against a tree.
And then the tear did blind her e’e.
She leaned her back against a thorn.
And there twa bonnie boys has she born.
She’s ta’en the napkin frae her neck.
And made tae them a winding sheet.
She’s ta’en oot her little penknife.
And she has twined them o’ their life.
She’s laid them ’neath a marble stane,
Thinking to gang a maiden hame.
She’s looked ower her faither’s wa’,
And she’s seen they twa bonnie boys at the ba’.
“O bonnie bairns, gin ye were mine,
I would dress ye in the silk sae fine.”
“O cruel mither, when we were thine.
We didna see ocht o’ the silk sae fine.”
“O bonnie bairns, come tell toe me.
What kind o’ a deith I’ll hae to dee?”
“Sieven year a fish-in the flood,
Sieven year a bird in the wood.
“Sieven year a tongue to the warnin’ bell,
Seven year in the caves o’ hell.”
“Welcome, welcome, fish in the flood.
Welcome, welcome, bird in the wood.
“Welcome tongue o’ the warning bell.
But God keep me frae the flames o’ Hell.”
Francis James Child’s ‘The English and Scottish Popular Ballads,” choses to highlight the several different ways in which the mother is said to have ended the children’s lives across different versions of the song. In one the children are buried alive, in another strangled, and in many more simply killed with the penknife. The penknife is an image that stands out and may reveal a connection to the opening track of Harry Smith’s Anthology of American Folk Music, ‘Henry Lee’ (1932). It recounts another woman who has recently borne the child of a young man only to find out he intends to leave her for another. In this case she turns the ‘pen-knife’ on her lover rather than her innocent child. Smith, in his liner notes, references several versions of this ballad titled ‘Young Hunting’ most originating from Scotland.
Ian Campbell’s version of The Cruel Mither on the Campbell Family’s Topic album The Singing Campbells (1965), includes the following note:
“Gavin Greig collected five versions of this ballad in Aberdeenshire, all to plainer tunes than that sung here. Ian’s tune, in fact, comes from Ewan MacColl’s aunt, Margaret Logan, a native of Perthshire. The texts of some of the first collected Scottish sets, notably in Herd’s Ancient and Modern Scottish Songs and Johnson’s The Scots Musical Museum, suggest pre-Christian origins for the ballad. This interesting version, too, gives us much of the powerful pagan mysticism.”
The tunes pre-Christian or pagan origins are of particular note. Ian Campbell’s and Bill Livingston’s version both include the following verse:
‘She wiped the blade against her shoe
On-a-lee and lonee
The more she rubbed the redder it grew
Down by the Greenwood Sidie-o’
These lines conjure images of MacBeth attempting to wash away the blood from his hands after the murder of Duncan. It may also allude to deeper pagan allusions. In Johnson’s The Scots Musical Museum version the opening line alludes to a spring time setting, ‘She sat down below a thorn, Fine flowers in the valley.’ One might draw connections to Beltein, or May Day, still observed on the first of May in much of Perthsire and other parts of Scotland. Beltein festivals still invoke many pagan practices of the past, if only symbolically; including the practice of human sacrifice. The following is an account of one such tradition from James George Frazer’s ‘The Golden Bough.’
“In the parish of Callander, a beautiful district of Western Perthshire, the Beltane custom was still in vogue towards the end of the eighteenth century. It has been described as follows by the parish minister of the time: "Upon the first day of May, which is called Beltan, or Baltein day, all the boys in a township or hamlet, meet in the moors. They cut a table in the green sod, of a round figure, by casting a trench in the ground, of such circumference as to hold the whole company. They kindle a fire, and dress a repast of eggs and milk in the consistence of a custard. They knead a cake of oatmeal, which is toasted at the embers against a stone. After the custard is eaten up, they divide the cake into so many portions, as similar as possible to one another in size and shape, as there are persons in the company. They daub one of these portions all over with charcoal, until it be perfectly black. They put all the bits of the cake into a bonnet. Every one, blindfold, draws out a portion. He who holds the bonnet, is entitled to the last bit. Whoever draws the black bit, is the devoted person who is to be sacrificed to Baal, whose favour they mean to implore, in rendering the year productive of the sustenance of man and beast. There is little doubt of these inhuman sacrifices having been once offered in this country, as well as in the east, although they now pass from the act of sacrificing, and only compel the devoted person to leap three times through the flames; with which the ceremonies of this festival are closed."
The 2/4 march version of the tune has a rhythm and feel verging on that of a hornpipe. After exploring the many past versions of the ballad this can seem quite peculiar. But Bill Livingstons version does seem to be an attempt to bridge the gap between ancient ballad and the modern march. Those serving in the ranks of the Scots guard are perhaps no strangers to the conflicting emotions surrounding the darker aspects of life.
Johnson’s The Scots Musical Museum Version:
SHE sat down below a thorn,
Fine flowers in the valley
And there she has her sweet babe born.
And the green leaves they grow rarely
' Smile na sae sweet, my bonie babe,
And ye smile sae sweet, ye '11 smile me dead.'
She 's taen out her little pen-knife,
And twinnd the sweet babe o its life.
She 's howket a grave by the light o the moon,
And there she 's buried her sweet babe in.
As she was going to the church,
She saw a sweet babe in the porch.
' O sweet babe, and thou were mine,
I wad cleed thee in the silk so fine.'
' 0 mother dear, when I was thine,
You did na prove to me sae kind.'
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