{"id":18849,"date":"2023-02-15T10:32:31","date_gmt":"2023-02-15T10:32:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/?page_id=18849"},"modified":"2025-07-20T09:41:23","modified_gmt":"2025-07-20T09:41:23","slug":"gilhooleys-supper-party","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/index.php\/gilhooleys-supper-party\/","title":{"rendered":"Gilhooley’s supper party"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This page quotes lyrics which contain offensive language, reflecting attitudes common in the period when this song was first performed.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

AKA<\/strong><\/td>There was ham
Gilhooly’s supper party<\/td><\/tr>
First Published<\/td>1888<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Writer\/composer<\/td>J.F.Mitchell with extra verses by EW Rogers<\/td>Roud<\/strong><\/td>RN4639<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Music Hall Performers<\/strong><\/td>Walter Munroe<\/td><\/tr>
Folk performances<\/strong><\/td>Collected from the singing of:<\/strong>
Cowboys in New Mexico and shepherds in The Falklands, no date but before 1923.<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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GILHOOLY'S SUPPER PARTY.\nCopyright, 1887, by F. Harding.\n\nGilhooly gave a supper to his friends a week ago;\nThere were guests from County Galway and from Sligo And Mayo,\nThe dining room was elegant with flowers and with fruit,\nAnd Gilhooly was a dandy in his open-vested suit.\nHe'd everything that grew above or underneath the ground;\nHe had a dozen naygurs for to hand the grub around.\nI never saw such etiquette as was displayed that night:\nI swear that it would knock a whitehouse dinner out of sight.\n\n\nThere was ham and lamb, beer by the bucket and imported Cham\nAnd you never saw such a divil of a jam as there was when we all sat down,\nWith forks and knives, we worked away like working for our lives, \nAnd the boys and girls, and the fellows and their wives nearly ate up half the town<\/em>\n\nWhen Father Murphy started Grace our heads we had to stoop.\nWhen Grace was over all the naygurs holler'd, \"Who's for soup?\"\nMaloney with his knife and fork his soup began to ate,\n'Till you never saw the whiskers of a man in such a state.\nWhen Burke began to monkey with a bird's anatomee,\nIt flew right off the table onto Miss Mulcahey's knee,\n\"Have you ever been to Turkey?\" says Gilhooly just for peace,\n\"I have not,\" says Miss Mulcahey,\"but at present I'm in Greece!\" \n\nBedalia Rooney ate so much we thought that she would die,\nSays she, \"I'm nearly bustin' but I'll take a piece of pie\"\nAnd then to cap the smilax, if she didn't may I sin,\nShe drank water from the bowl she should have washed her fingers in.\nBut taken altogether, it's a thing we won't forget,\nAnd wait awhile, my Buckos, you've not heard the finish yet,\nGilhooly says, \"You don't get suppers like this ev'ry day,\n'Twill cost you just a V apiece\" and faith we had to pay.<\/pre>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
[“Naygur” is a stage-Irish version of the racist term n****r]<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>
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A song written in 1887 for Walter Munroe<\/a> by ex-patriate British music hall songwriter,\u00a0JF Mitchell,<\/a>\u00a0after he had emigrated to the USA. The earliest published form I can find is in 1887 in the USA, and the first sheet music was published in the UK in 1888. The British version had additional verses written by EW Rogers<\/a>. The Mitchell\/Munroe team were also responsible for The agricultural Irish girl<\/em>.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gilhooley’s Supper Party<\/em> seems to have been taken up enthusiastically by amateur singers in the 1890s and there are multiple reports in British newspapers of it being performed in smoking concerts and on other informal occasions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thirty or so years after it was first performed, the chorus was collected by Charles Finger from the singing of a cowboy in New Mexico on the Upper Penasco<\/em> and from a crowd of boozing shepherds in the Falkland Islands.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Sources:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n