BURYING THE DEAD HORSE

BURYING THE DEAD HORSE

When sailors signed on a voyage in the days of sail they were paid a month’s wages in advance.. This was spent on clothing and equipment needed for the trip, as well as grog, women and the other necessities of a sailor’s life. Because they had to work this payment off before they were paid again, the first month of the voyage was known as ‘working off the dead horse.’ When the month was over:

… the sailors performed the ceremony called “Burying the Dead Horse,” the explanation of which is this: Before leaving port seamen are paid a month in advance, so as to enable them to leave some money with their wives, or to buy a new kit, etc., and having spent the money they consider the first month goes for nothing, and so call it “Working off the Dead Horse.”  The crew dress up a figure to represent a horse; its body is made out of a barrel, its extremities of hay or straw covered with canvas, the mane and tail of hemp, the eyes of two ginger beer bottles, sometimes filled with phosphorus.  When complete the noble steed is put on a box, covered with a rug, and on the evening of the last day of the month a man gets on to his back, and is drawn all round the ship by his shipmates, to the chanting of the following doggerel:—

BURYING THE DEAD HORSE.

You have come a long long way,
   And we say so, for we know so.
For to be sold upon this day,
   Poor old man.

You are goin’ now to say good-bye,
   And we say so, for we know so.
Poor old horse you’re a goin’ to die,
   Poor Old Man.

Having paraded the decks in order to get an audience, the sale of the horse by auction is announced, and a glib-mouthed man mounts the rostrum and begins to praise the noble animal, giving his pedigree, etc., saying it was a good one to go, for it had gone 6,000 p. 23miles in the past month!  The bidding then commences, each bidder being responsible only for the amount of his advance on the last bid.  After the sale the horse and its rider are run up to the yard-arm amidst loud cheers.  Fireworks are let off, the man gets off the horse’s back, and, cutting the rope, lets it fall into the water.  The Requiem is then sung to the same melody.

Now he is dead and will die no more,
   And we say so, for we know so.
Now he is gone and will go no more;
   Poor Old Man.

After this the auctioneer and his clerk proceed to collect the “bids,” and if in your ignorance of auction etiquette you should offer your’s to the auctioneer, he politely declines it, and refers you to his clerk!

This was how later (Sir) Richard Tangye, bound for Melbourne aboard the Parramatta in 1879 recalled the ceremony aboard that ship. (Richard Tangye, Reminiscences of travel in Australia, America, and Egypt, London, 1884).

On the same ship and the same voyage a young man named George Haswell took the trouble to document the sailors’ work shanties. He was a skilled musician and transcribed the words and music of their songs, including the ‘Dead Horse’. (view at http://acms.sl.nsw.gov.au/album/ItemViewer.aspx?itemid=1071002&suppress=N&imgindex=95, item number 5).

The same year Alfred Simmons was aboard the steamship Stad Haarlem out of England bound for New Zealand:

‘We had this evening what to the sailors was evidently splendid fun, and what to the emigrants was at least a novelty. An auspicious ceremony, known to seamen as “Flogging the Dead Horse,” has been performed. For the benefit of the uninitiated I explain. When the crew for a vessel are engaged, the owners allow them to draw the first month’s wages in advance; and those who know our sailors best will be disposed to believe that not a great amount of the “advance” remains in hand when eventually the crew ship themselves for the voyage. The sailors regard this first month’s work as a sort of nightmare – the sooner it is over the better they like it. And when the month is up, and their wages commence to accumulate, they celebrate the occasion.’

Simmons then described what he witnessed:

‘Well, this day completed the first month of the sailors’ service; and they manufactured what they called, and what for courtesy’s sake I will also call, “a horse.” The carcase was fearfully and wonderfully made. Some canvas which had done service for our good ship for the past three years, was first sewn into shape, and by dint of much intricate work and delicate persuasion, the internal organs, in the shape of shavings and hay, were artistically inserted. The assistance of a pseudo veterinary surgeon was then called into requisition, the needle and thread were applied, and the carcase stood forth a completed thing. And it was a sight to behold. The shades of evening were approaching, and with them there came the sounds of laughter and revelry. From the forecastle there emerged a roaring procession of Englishmen, Irishmen, Scotchmen, and Dutchmen – sailors, cooks, stokers, engineers, and emigrants. In their midst, bound around its neck with a stout rope, they dragged the unhappy effigy of their own creation, and even as Macbeth’s witches marched around the seething cauldron, so even marched my heterogeneous procession round and round the ship, chanting to a horribly flat minor key:

Poor old man, thy horse will die—

Poor old horse. And when he dies we’ll tan his hide—

Poor old horse. Poor old horse, thy days are ended—

Poor old horse.

The ceremony next involved executing the horse, followed by the crew begging for alcohol from the passengers:

‘Having repeated the chanting of this elegant piece of poesy for half an hour or more, the procession wended its way to the foremast, which one of the sailors mounted, carrying with him a line attached to the “ poor old horse.” Amid the united “hurrahs”' of the English, Irish, and Scotchmen, and the deep-toned “ Hoera’s!” of the Dutchmen, the effigy was then hauled up to the yardarm. Sundry invocations to the publican’s “spirits” were offered up at this solemn juncture; and presently, accompanied by a final roar of merriment, the line attached to the executed “old horse” was cut, the effigy fell with a loud plunge into the sea, and in a few moments the “horse” was lost to the sight of mortal man for ever. The upshot of all this mummery was that we – the saloon passengers – were “respectfully invited” to stand glasses of grog all round to the crew. It was not within the power of human nature to withstand such an appeal, so sundry bottles of whisky were subscribed for, and glasses were ordered.’

(https://archive.org/stream/oldenglandandne00simmgoog#page/n120/mode/2up)

 From Hugill

There are many other accounts of this maritime ceremony, which was extant before 1845. It must have been eerie in the dusk as well as enjoyable for crew and passengers. Certainly all accounts involve alcohol. But what did it sound like as the crew  advanced across the deck chanting and pushing or pulling a horse-shaped structure, sometimes with glowing eyes (phosphorus in empty bottles) and occasionally with fireworks. We’ll never know. But we can hear the song in a modern rendition.

Graham Seal

PS: Sometimes the dead horse shanty song was used for another custom known as the ‘Sailor’s Grace’. Once all the fresh meat aboard ship had been consumed and the first barrel of salted meat – known as ‘salt horse’ - was opened, this song was sung:

‘Salt horse, salt horse, we’d have you know

That to the galley you must go.

The cook without a sign of grief

Will boil you down and call you beef

And we poor sailors standing near

Must eat you though you look so queer.

Salt horse, salt horse, what brought you here?’

And an American version from 1840:

“Old horse, old horse, what brings you here,
From Saccarap’ to Portland pier?”
“I’ve carted stone for many a year,
‘Til now worn out by sore abuse,
I’m salted down for sailors’ use.
Between the mainmast and the pumps,
I’m salted down in great big lumps;
They curse my eyes and pick my bones,
And throw the rest to Davy Jones.”
Poor old horse!

(http://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/songstorysamplercollection/27/)

FURTHER SOURCES

Stan Hugill, Shanties from the Seven Seas, London, 1961.

Parramatta Sun : a serio-comic magazine, issued fortnightly, during the voyage of the ship "Parramatta" from London to Sydney, September 9th 1879, to December 8th 1879.

The Ballad Index by Robert B. Waltz and David G. Engle at http://www.fresnostate.edu/folklore/ballads/Doe014.html

Graham Seal (ed), Ten shanties : sung on the Australian run 1879 / collected and transcribed by George H. Haswell, Antipodes Press, 1992.