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Come all ye friends I'll sit ya down
And sing an awful ditty,
'Twas on a day in April month
We started from the city;
We planned a day or two at Mahers
We stalwart men were chosen
To remove old Charlie from Angle Pond
Who fell in when the pond was frozen.
We seven men came roaring down
On the road to Roach's Line,
We might have stopped in Avondale
Or Brigus might have been fine;
We was hungry as sin but we never stopped in
Nor took any time to park us,
We all of us knew that we must get through
To remove old Charlie's carcass.
Here's to Charlie Horse
Here's to Shade the Master,
No better horse ne'er ran the course
Nor pulled the logs more faster;
Here's to Charlie Horse
And I wants ye all to know,
Charlie's gone to the big corral
Where all good horses go.
In the car was Old Pocket Comb
And beside him Old Moose Coosten,
And Barracuda Bill and Jimmy Clark
In the back seat he was roostin';
There was Smiley Stubborn and the Mounted Police
It wasn't hard to find him,
And Johnny Pollack and Sagebrush Sam
Was sitting right in beside him.
Kevin and Buck was also there
For they brought some brawn and brains,
They was aiming to help as best they could
To remove old Chuck's remains;
Charlie was like a brother to Shade
And he loved him well of course,
Charlie was a very good man, you see,
Although he'd been a horse.
Here's to Charlie Horse
Here's to Shade the Master,
No better horse ne'er ran the course
Nor pulled the logs more faster;
Here's to Charlie Horse
And I wants ye all to know,
Charlie's gone to the big corral
Where all good horses go.
Now I'll spare you all the gruesome details
And just relate the end,
With two stout dories and a few strong ropes
We removed old Shady's friend;
We gave him a decent send-off
With all our hats removed,
So long as we helped old Shade and his friend
Our loyalty was proved.
Somewhere up in the great beyond
His eyes are shining bright,
Charlie nods an approving nod
'Cause he knows we did him right;
Shade will join him there one day
And he'll bring the harness leather,
And so and for all of eternity
They'll pull the logs together.
Here's to Charlie Horse
Here's to Shade the Master,
No better horse ne'er ran the course
Nor pulled the logs more faster;
Here's to Charlie Horse
And I wants ye all to know,
Charlie's gone to the big corral
Where all good horses go.
Here's to Charlie Horse
Here's to Shade the Master,
No better horse ne'er ran the course
Nor pulled the logs more faster;
Here's to Charlie Horse
And I wants ye all to know,
Charlie's gone to the big corral
Where all good horses go.
This variant arranged and recorded by Great Big Sea (The Hard And The Easy, trk#7, 2005, recorded at Great Big Studio, St. John's, NL).
See more songs by Great Big Sea.
From: Omar Blondahl's Contribution to the Newfoundland Folksong Canon by Neil Rosenberg, 1991:
Concerning Charlie Horse and The Return of Charlie Horse are two songs about a party involving the retrieval and burial of Charlie, the horse who fell through the ice of Angle Pond in Mahers near St. John's in the spring of 1956. Concerning Charlie Horse, which Blondahl co-authored along with a local man, who along with Blondahl was one of ten named in the song, was a hit in St. John's and is a good example of a moniker song which achieved popularity in part because listeners could identify the names and nicknames of the men in it.
The YouTube video below features a live performance of a variant by Great Big Sea at Barrie Molson Centre, Barrie, Ontario, Nov. 18, 2008.
