Samuel Young

Come all you people, old and young
Come listen to my feeble song,
And I'll relate before I'm done
The certain death of Samuel Young

He lived in London, Kentucky State,
It was in eighteen and forty-eight.
The call was in for men to go
To these lowlands in Mexico.

Because he loved a lady fair,
Whose father was a snareling heir,
Saying: You shall go, I'll let you know,
To the lowlands in Mexico. (or)
To fight the foe in Mexico.

They tore him from his mother dear,
Whose heart and eyes was filled with tears;
Saying: "You shall go, I'll let you see,"
He only got to Monteree.

There sickness seized this tender lad,
Which soon confined him to his bed.
No frightful no dreadful sight
Soon out this breathless thread of life.

His spirit's gone to worlds unknown,
His body lies there in the tomb
And there must lie till that great day
When hills and mountains melts away.

Note: This, I guess is a sort of un-ballad --- a narrative song
where the narrative line is pretty much non-existent. Anyway,
Sharp collected it. RG
From English Folk Songs in the Southern Appalachian Mountains,
Sharp. Collected from Mrs. Sina Boone, NC, 1918

RG