Still I Love Him

Sung by Bob Roberts with melodeon accompaniment.

Recorded on “The Barley Mow” Songs from the Village Inn collected by Peter Kennedy, HMV E.M.I. 7EG 8288 Side 1, Track 1.

Duration: 2 min. 35.41 sec.

 Recorded under the auspices of the EFDSS.

Still I Love Him is also known as He Comes Down Our Alley.  Kennedy 1984, gives a London version on p. 460 (no. 203) with notes to further variants on p. 479. Hugill (1969) cites the nautical version as given here as typical of the songs of bargees and coast fishermen, particularly from East Anglia. The tune is an adaptation of the ubiquitous Villikins.

1. When I was single I had a black shawl,
Now I am married I’ve nothing at all,

Refrain:
Still I love him, I’ll forgive him,
I’ll go with him where ever he goes.

2. He gave me a handkerchief, red, white and blue,
Then to clean windows he tore it in two.

3. He came up the row and he whispered me out,
Then he went off with young Kitty McLeod.

4. My back is a-breaking my fingers are sore,
Gutting the herring he brings to the shore.

5. The storm is a-raging his boat isn’t in,
T’others won’t tell me what’s happened to him.

6. If he’s gone to Heaven he’ll come to no harm,
If he’s gone to Hell then he’ll keep himself warm.

The song was recorded at “The Butt and Oyster” Pinmill, near Ipswich, Suffolk while Bob Roberts was the skipper of the sprit-sail Thames Barge Cambria. He was a popular performer on the BBC’s Radio and Television during the 1950s and 60s, both through his singing and his storytelling, and he recorded a number of folksongs and shanties, particularly through the EFDSS collected under the direction of Peter Kennedy. A book about his life on board the Cambria titled Last of the Sailormen can be found listed on the Internet.