{"id":4106,"date":"2020-07-04T05:23:48","date_gmt":"2020-07-04T05:23:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/?page_id=4106"},"modified":"2022-08-08T10:02:15","modified_gmt":"2022-08-08T10:02:15","slug":"with-my-little-wigger-wagger-in-my-hand","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/index.php\/with-my-little-wigger-wagger-in-my-hand\/","title":{"rendered":"With my little wigger-wagger in my hand"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
AKA<\/strong><\/td>The little wigger-wagger in my hand
Little wigger-wagger<\/td><\/tr>
First Published<\/td> 1909<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
Lyrics<\/strong><\/td>Fred Earle<\/td>Music<\/strong><\/td> Frank Carter & Gilbert Wells<\/td>Roud<\/strong><\/td>21961<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\n
Music Hall Performers<\/strong><\/td>Fred Earle<\/td><\/tr>
Folk performances<\/strong><\/td>Source Singers<\/strong>
unknown, 1959, England
Charlie Moore, 1964\/65, Suffolk England
<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n
\n
There's one thing about me, there's no doubt\nI look a masher when I'm walking about\nPeople stare but I don't know why\nP'raps it is because I wear a collar and a tie\nNo joke, my poke tho' a trifle red\nDoesn't make them look at me a lot\nBut there's one thing people seem to think is funny\nAnd I tell you what it is, just what.\n\nIt's the little wigger-wagger in my hand\nThat makes me such a dandy\nIt's not my strut, nor my face tut-tut\nNot the brand new cady like a pimple on my nut\nMaidies and the ladies I meet when I'm walking in the Strand\nThey admire my togs and I keep away the dogs\nWith my little wigger-wagger in my hand.<\/em>\n\nI went to a fancy dress ball one night\nDressed up as a cupid! What a lovely sight\nIn pink tights, cos I don't like black\nGot a pair of chicken wings and stuck them on my back\nIn Bow, you know, I picked up a bow\nBought it very cheap, why, I be blowed\nAt my side I wore a quiver full of arrows\nThat I hired up in Harrow Road.\n\nWith my little wigger-wagger in my hand\nI walked into the ballroom\nBut I blushed with pride, for the girls all cried\n'If I catch you bending' and I thought I should have died\nFellows, they were jealous\nBut why it was I couldn't understand\nFor I stood just so with my arrow and my bow\nAnd my little wigger-wagger in my hand.<\/em>\n\nNot long ago, on a winter's night\nI dropped the candle and the house caught alight\nFiremen came as the stairs gave way\nI was in the attic when the hose began to play\nWater oughter put the fire out\nBut it didn't do it, as it ought\nSo to rescue me the firemen got a ladder\nBut the ladder was a lot too short.\n\nWith my little wigger-wagger in my hand\nI crept out of the window\nAnd upon my soul, up a telegraph pole\nI climbed, lor' lumme, with my face as black as coal\nSizzling and a-frizzling\nI did a bit of Blondin understand?\nWith my shirt on fire, then I walked along the wire\nWith my little wigger-wagger in my hand.<\/em>\n\nI had a girl named Mary Price\nThough she was beautiful and oh, so nice\nI took her to the church one day\nBrought a pal along with me to give the girl away\nIn ran some man in a pinafore\nPut it on to cover up his pants\nThen he asked me 'Will you take this little woman?'\nBut I never got an earthly chance.\n\nWith my little wigger-wagger in my hand\nI stood before the altar\nThen Parson Gray to the bride did say\n'Will you take this gentleman to honour and obey?'\nMary so contrary\nShe diddled me so beautiful and grand\nFor she bunked from church and she left me in the lurch\nWith my little wigger-wagger in my hand.<\/em>\n\nOnce at the seaside, Margate way\nI had a little dip in Pegwell Bay\nLeft my clothes on a sandy beach\nPut them where I reckoned that the water wouldn't reach\nSidestroke, wide stroke, I began to swim\nBobbing in the water like a boat\nAnd on my cane I tied a pair of bladders\nJust to hold me up and make me float.\n\nWith my little wigger-wagger in my hand\nI left the salt seawater\nBut I felt a jay - to my great dismay\nFor the waves carried all my toggery away\nI there I felt a pie there\nFor all the girls were laughing on the sand\nAs away I raced with a kipper round my waist\nAnd my little wigger-wagger in my hand.<\/em><\/pre>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
Another risqu\u00e9 song from Fred Earle<\/a>, this one apparently not so well remembered as Seaweed<\/em>, but found the singing of two late 20th-century traditional singers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
John Rorke performed the song on the BBC Radio programme\u00a0Palace of Varieties\u00a0<\/em>broadcast from an imaginary Hall between 1937 and 1958 \u2013 its possible that later performers heard it first on this radio programme.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sources:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n