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GONNA GET HOME BY 'N' BY Lead: Richard

A typical West Indian or Southern states work song taken to sea and turned into an American hauling chantey.

LYRICS:

Sister Susan an' my gal Sal
Chorus: Gonna get home by 'n' by!
All a-gonna live down Shinbone Al
Chorus: Gonna get home by 'n' by!

Grand Chorus:
Gonna get home by 'n' by
Gonna get home by 'n' by

Portugee Joe came down our Al
He went and ran off with my Sal

So I thought I'd take a trip to sea
So I shipped aboard o' a big Yankee

I shipped out of old Nantucket
That ship was like a leaky bucket

I told my cap'n my hands was cold
God damn yer hands, let the old ship roll

Oh, Cap'n Lamson is mighty damn mean
I think he come from New Orleans

A whaler's life's no life for me
I jumped her an' I left the sea

I ran right back to Shinbone Al
I'm a-gonna find me a new gal Sal

NOTES:

Verses five and six of this shanty come from F.P. Harlow's Chanteying Aboard American Ships. Harlow gives the work song as a "'Badian Hand over Hand" and calls it "Gwine To Git A Home Bime By" without any further explanation.

The rest of the verses come from Stan Hugill's Shanties from the Seven Seas. Hugill gives this shanty as a hauling song and calls it Sister Susan with an alternative title of Shinbone Al. It's another typical West Indian or Southern States' work song taken to sea and turned into a shanty. Shinbone Alley, says Hugill, is a location often mentioned in African-American songs. His source was the black shantyman Harry Lauder of St. Lucia, B.W.I., who gave it as a hauling song. Bullen, another collector, also heard it in the West Indies, and the circumstances in which he learned it are to be found in his book The Log of a Sea Wolf, but he gives it as a windlass or capstan shanty.