{"id":630,"date":"2015-10-06T14:06:20","date_gmt":"2015-10-06T13:06:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/glen-of-aherlow-the\/"},"modified":"2016-01-25T11:34:18","modified_gmt":"2016-01-25T11:34:18","slug":"glen-of-aherlow-the","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/glen-of-aherlow-the\/","title":{"rendered":"Glen of Aherlow, The"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2 id=\"t:seinnteoirin1\">Play recording: Glen of Aherlow, The<\/h2>\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-630-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/00-micil\/me\u00e1in\/glen-of-aherlow-the.mp3?_=1\" \/><source type=\"audio\/ogg\" src=\"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/00-micil\/me\u00e1in\/glen-of-aherlow-the.ogg?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/00-micil\/me\u00e1in\/glen-of-aherlow-the.mp3\">https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/00-micil\/me\u00e1in\/glen-of-aherlow-the.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<div class=\"dmeite\">\n<p><span id=\"neasc-nocht-ceilth\" class=\"nmeite\">view \/ hide recording details [+\/-]<\/span><\/p>\n<ul id=\"clarMeiteashonrai\" class=\"meiteashonrai\">\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Teideal <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Title)<\/span>:<\/span> Glen of Aherlow, The.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Uimhir Chatal\u00f3ige Ollscoil Washington <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(University of Washington Catalogue Number)<\/span>:<\/span> 853903.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Uimhir Chnuasach Bh\u00e9aloideas \u00c9ireann <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(National Folklore of Ireland Number)<\/span>:<\/span> none.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Uimhir Roud <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Roud Number)<\/span>:<\/span> 983.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Uimhir Laws <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Laws Number)<\/span>:<\/span> J11.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Uimhir Child <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Child Number)<\/span>:<\/span> none.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Cnuasach <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Collection)<\/span>:<\/span> Joe Heaney Collection, University of Washington, Seattle.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Teanga na Cro\u00edmh\u00edre <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Core-Item Language)<\/span>:<\/span> English.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Catag\u00f3ir <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Category)<\/span>:<\/span> song.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Ainm an t\u00e9 a thug <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Name of Informant)<\/span>:<\/span> Joe Heaney.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Ainm an t\u00e9 a th\u00f3g <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Name of Collector)<\/span>:<\/span> Lucy Simpson.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">D\u00e1ta an taifeadta <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Recording Date)<\/span>:<\/span> 24\/07\/1979.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Su\u00edomh an taifeadta <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Recording Location)<\/span>:<\/span> Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, New York, United States of America.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Oc\u00e1id an taifeadta <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Recording Occasion)<\/span>:<\/span> private.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">Daoine eile a bh\u00ed i l\u00e1thair <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Others present)<\/span>:<\/span> unavailable.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai\">St\u00e1das ch\u00f3ipcheart an taifeadta <span class=\"lipead-meiteashonrai-bearla\">(Recording copyright status)<\/span>:<\/span> unavailable.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<p>JH: Will I tell you a little bit about Patrick Sheehan? He came from Aherlow in Tipperary, and he joined- went to the Crimean War&hellip; and at the age of thirty-four he was blinded in the trenches. And because he joined the English, against his own countrymen, they had no time for him at home. He got nine months&#8217; pension; and when that was finished, he wandered the streets, begging&hellip; This is true. The Crimean War lasted&hellip; couple or three years only, 1854 to 1856. And that&#8217;s when a lot of&hellip; people. All you had to do that time was take a drink off a sergeant, or the police, or the army, and they put a shilling into the glass, and the minute you drank out of that glass with the shilling in, that was your enlistment in the army&hellip; I&#8217;m not sure was Patrick Sheehan- I think Patrick Sheehan was in a position he had nowhere else to go, so he had to join the army. There was no work, nothing, there was- All his people had [been] thrown out of their land and died, and he had to get his living, so he joined the army.<\/p>\n<p>LS: He fought with the English?<\/p>\n<p>JH: He fought with the English in the Crimean War.<\/p>\n<p>LS: Why did he go back home?<\/p>\n<p>JH: Well he wanted to go home to see&hellip; to feel the place where he was born; he got lonely. And he knew he wouldn&#8217;t be welcome home, because he joined the British army, you see, so he wandered around like a mendicant, from place to place, begging his food. And he reckoned that if he came near where he was born and the people recognized him, you see, they wouldn&#8217;t have any time for him. He couldn&#8217;t anyway- He would be shamed to show his face there, because he let them down so much.<\/p>\n<p>LS: So where was he?<\/p>\n<p>JH: He was in England, going around from place to place.<\/p>\n<p>LS: Oh, in England. I thought you said-<\/p>\n<p>JH: No, I said, he was afraid to face home because he was blinded in the Crimea, was taken prisoner but eventually sent home to England, and was kept there. For nine months he got a pension, and after that, when that ran out he walked the streets, begging, here and there, whatever he got.<\/p>\n<p>LS: Who do you remember singing this song?<\/p>\n<p>JH: My father.<\/p>\n<p>LS: Do a lot of the people sing it?<\/p>\n<p>JH: Oh yeah. It&#8217;s a well known song around my area. I&#8217;m sure it&#8217;s a well-known song all over Ireland, but that&#8217;s the first time I heard of it, in my own home. Every man in the village had this particular song, because they thought the world- They were- felt so sorry for Patrick Sheehan first of all because they were evicted out of their home. When it came then to joining the British army, people understood he had to do something to earn his living, so they forgave him&hellip; But when a man is dying of hunger he&#8217;ll do a lot of things, you know&hellip; They was the one crowd that time, anyway, Ireland and England was the same that time, more or less, they had to do what England told them to do. But anyway, I&#8217;ll go on with the song. Right?<\/p>\n<p>My name is Patrick Sheehan, my years are thirty-four<br \/>\nTipperary is my native home, not far from Galtymore<br \/>\nI came of honest parents, but now they&#8217;re lying low<br \/>\nIt&#8217;s many the happy day I spent in the Glen of Aherlow.<\/p>\n<p>My father died &#8211; I closed his eyes &#8211; outside the cabin door<br \/>\nThe landlord and the sheriff was there the day before;<br \/>\nAnd then my loving brothers, and sisters three also,<br \/>\nWere forced to go with a broken heart from the Glen of Aherlow.<\/p>\n<p>For three long months in search of work I wandered far and near<br \/>\nI went into the poorhouse to see my mother dear<br \/>\nThe news I had near broke my heart; but still in all my woe<br \/>\nI blessed the friends who made her grave in the Glen of Aherlow<\/p>\n<p>Bereft of home, of kith and kin, with plenty all around<br \/>\nI starved within my cabin, and slept upon the ground;<br \/>\nBut cruel as my lot was, I ne&#8217;er did hardship know<br \/>\nTil I joined the English army far away from Aherlow.<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;Rouse up, there,&#8217; said the corporal, &#8216;you lazy Irish hound!<br \/>\nWhy don&#8217;t you hear, you sleepy dog, the call to arms round?&#8217;<br \/>\nAlas, I had been dreaming of days of long ago;<br \/>\nI awoke before Sebastopol &#8211; but not in Aherlow.<\/p>\n<p>I groped to find my musket, how dark I thought the night.<br \/>\nOh, blessed God, it wasn&#8217;t night &#8211; it was the broad daylight!<br \/>\nAnd when I found that I was blind, my tears began to flow<br \/>\nI longed for even a pauper&#8217;s grave in the Glen of Aherlow.<\/p>\n<p>A poor neglected mendicant I wander through the streets<br \/>\nMy nine months&#8217; pension now being out, I beg from all I meet<br \/>\nSince I joined my country&#8217;s tyrant, my face I&#8217;ll never show<br \/>\nAmong the kind old neighbours in the Glen of Aherlow.<\/p>\n<p>Oh, Blessed Virgin Mary, mine is a mournful tale<br \/>\nA poor blind prisoner here I am in Brixton&#8217;s dreary jail!<br \/>\nStruck blind within the trenches, where I&#8217;ll never fear the foe<br \/>\nAnd I&#8217;ll never see my friends again in the Glen of Aherlow.<br \/>\nNow Irish youth, dear countrymen, take heed of what I say<br \/>\nIf you join the English ranks, you&#8217;ll surely to rue the day.<br \/>\nWhenever you are tempted a-soldiering to go<br \/>\nRemember Patrick Sheehan from the Glen of Aherlow.<\/p>\n<div class=\"n\u00f3ta\u00ed-bun-leathanaigh\">\n<h2 id=\"t:notai\">Notes<\/h2>\n<p>This song, also known by the name Patrick Sheehan, was published in 1857 by Charles Kickham (1828-1882) specifically in protest at the treatment of Patrick Sheehan, who had been arrested and sentenced to seven years imprisonment in Dublin for begging in Grafton Street. The ballad rapidly became popular throughout the country, and the outcry is thought to have led the government to grant his release and award him a lifelong pension of a shilling per day. Note that, if these details are correct, the wounded soldier did not remain in England, but returned to Ireland &#8211; though not, seemingly, to the Glen of Aherlow. Joe tells Lucy that he learned the song from his father.<\/p>\n<p>Joe uses the same air for &#8216;The Old Oak Tree;&#8217; this is also the air associated with &#8216;Mn\u00e1 Deasa Bhaile Locha Riach&#8217; (also known as Neil\u00ed Bh\u00e1n) in Irish. He recorded it for Ewan Mac Coll and Peggy Seeger in 1963; seeThe Road from Conamara (2000). For further information, see Jim Carroll and Pat MacKenzie, Around the Hills of Clare (CD and booklet, Musical Traditions MTCD331-2, 2004) which includes a performance by Vincie Boyle; also Georges-Denis Zimmerman, Songs of Irish Rebellion (Dublin, 1967).<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"templates\/template-full-width.php","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-amhrain","category-amhrain-i-mbearla"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=630"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1480,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630\/revisions\/1480"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeheaney.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}