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Description: | This is rather a twee Victorian parlour ballad, but is of interest with regards to the local invention of the lifeboat. - At the time this song was written, the mouth of the River Tyne was an extremely hazardous place. Piers had not yet been erected and ships could easily be blown in the direction of the perilous Black Middens, a dangerous reef which cost the life of numerous crews. After a series of particularly bad wrecks in which onlookers were unable to launch rescue boats to aid drowning crews, a committee of South Shields businessmen placed an advert in the Newcastle Courant (1789) offering a generous reward to anyone who could design a boat capable of launching in heavy seas. After numerous entries, the committee narrowed the competition down to two men, William Wouldhave and Henry Greathead. After receiving a consolation prize, Wouldhave was informed that Henry Greathead had been selected to design the boat. Much controversy then arose over the origin of Greathead's final design, some believing that he had in fact simply made additions to Wouldhave's original plans.This song forms part of a selection of songs from 'Selkirk's collection of songs and ballads' currently held by the Border History Museum. The content was selected and edited by local publisher James Selkirk in 1853. The volume contains over 250 pages of songs, with contributions from local favourites such as William Mitford, Robert Emery and John Selkirk. Bound in leather, the collection was published at a time when smaller penny song books, so popular during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, were fading out and larger bound volumes such as this, which appealed to the middle classes, were becoming increasingly popular.Of the publisher, little is known. - Information at the head of a song by John Selkirk reveals that the publisher of this volume was not the James Selkirk, brother of John, who passed away in 1845, some 8 years before the publication of this collection. A mystery it appears. ; Local songs selected by Tyneside composer James Selkirk | Publisher: | James Selkirk Newcastle upon Tyne | Rights holder: | rights holder : Border History Museum | Subjects: | invention and progress Lifeboats | Temporal: | start=1841;end=1860; | Source: | Folk Archive Resource North East | Identifier: | farne:H2117002 | Go to resource |
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