Sam’s Gone Away is a capstan chantey of murky origins. While varying sea music historians like to claim it for one origin or another, folk musicologists pin it as a ballad of English origins that “might” date to the late 18th century but certainly before the 1820s.  It appears in some of the singing tradition in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, as well as having made its way into the traditions of fishermen and maritime workers of the southern US and along the Gulf of Mexico; folk songs tend to do that, being picked up by others and so moves along; consider the myriad folk songs of English, Irish, Scottish, and Welsh origin that made it into the lexicon of Appalachian culture.  It’s a good starter chantey as it is mostly chorus, the leader simply singing the opening line alone. It starts with wishing to be a cabin boy and rises up through the ranks ultimately ending with wishing to be the admiral! But many today add silly lines such as wishing to be the figurehead or a seagull or even a barnacle.

Jos. Morneault

 

Cliff singing “Sam’s Gone Away” on the 1976 Folkways album “Colonial and Revolutionary War Sea Songs & Chanteys“.

 

I wish I was a cabin boy, aboard a man o’ war!
Sam’s gone away, aboard a man o’ war!
Pretty work, brave boys,
Pretty work, I say!
Sam’s gone away, aboard a man o’ war!

I wish I was sailor, aboard a man o’ war!

I wish I was foretopman, aboard a man o’ war!

I wish I was a gunner, aboard a man o’ war!

I wish I was the bos’un aboard a man o’ war!

I wish I was a midshipman…

I wish I was the master…

I wish I was lieutenant…

I wish I was the captain…

I wish I was the admiral…