Bill Bailey, won’t you please come home

This song uses racist language and draws on stereotypes in a way that was commonplace at the time but no longer acceptable today.

On one Summer's day, Sun was shining fine
The lady love of old Bill Bailey
Was hanging clothes on the line
In her back yard, and weeping (or crying) hard
She married a B. and O. brakeman dat took and throw'd her down
Bellering like a prune-fed calf, wid a big gang hanging 'round
And to dat crowd, she yelled out loud,

Won't you come home, Bill Bailey, won't you come home?
She moans de whole day long
I'll do de cooking darling, I'll pay de rent,
I knows I've done you wrong
Member dat rainy eve dat I drove you out
Wid nothing but a fine tooth comb
I knows I'se to blame, ain't dat a shame
Bill Bailey won't you please come home?'

Bill drove by dat door, in an automobile
A great big diamond, coach and foot man
Hear dat big wench squeal,
'He's all alone' I heard her groan
She hollared thro' that door, 'Bill bailey is you sore ?
Stop a minute, won't you listen to me, won't I see you no more?'
Bill winked his eye as he heard her cry,

An American comic song from the early 20th century which based its humour racist stereotypes, at the time such songs were known as “coon songs”. The song was a huge hit throughout the English-speaking world and became a jazz standard. In the British Music Halls it was particularly associated with the performer  Victoria Monks  who started singing the song in 1904, combining it with a “characteristic cakewalk dance” suggesting that the performer reinforced the lyrics with racist physical comedy, though there is no suggestion that she wore blackface minstrel make up.

The song has been collected from traditional singers in America and Canada, but it was such a popular song that it’s likely to have also been sung by similar performers in Britain and elsewhere. Later versions tend to strip out the most outrageous elements of the racist patois in the original.

Sources:

• Entries in the Roud Indexes at the Vaughn Williams Memorial Library: https://archives.vwml.org/search/all:single[folksong-broadside-books]/0_50/all/score_desc/extended-roudNo_tr%3A4325
• Kilgarrif Sing Us
• Lyrics: monologues.co.uk
• Sheet Music: not accessed
• “The Palace”, The Stage, March 31 1904, p16
• Ballad Index

Last Updated on March 16, 2024 by John Baxter | Published: November 3, 2022