White wings

WHITE WINGS.
Copyright, 1884, by Willis Woodward & Co.
Written and sung by Banks Winter.

Sail! home, as straight as an arrow.
My yacht shoots along on the crest of the sea;
Sail! home, to sweet Maggie Darrow,
In her dear little home she is waiting for me.
High up! where the cliffs they are craggy,
That's where the girl of my heart waits for me!
Heigh! ho, I long for you, Maggie,
I'll spread out my White Wings and sail home to thee.
Yo! ho, how we go! oh, how the winds blow!

White Wings, they never grow weary.
They carry me cheerily over the sea;
Night comes, I long for my dearie,
I'll spread out my White Wings, and sail home to thee.

Sail! home, to love and caresses,
When Maggie, my darling, is there at my side;
Sail! home, blue eyes and gold tresses,
The fairest of all is my own little bride.
Sail! home, to part from thee never,
Always together life's voyage shall be;
Sail! home, to love thee forever!
I'll spread out my White Wings and sail home to thee.
Yo! ho, how we go! oh, how the winds blow!

A sentimental song widely collected from traditional singers on both sides of the Atlantic.

It was regularly performed on the Music Hall stage in the 1880s and 90s by a variety of performers but it was originally written and performed in America by blackface minstrel singer Banks Winter. According to Turner and Miall, Winter bought the rights to the song from Joseph Gullick, before substantially rewriting the words and music and republishing it under his own name.

The song became hugely popular both in Britain and the United States, it was widely published both as official sheet music , and in cheap street literature. In Britain it was perhaps most associated with the singing of Charles Oswell, a performer with the Mohawk Minstrels. The song was widely parodied by Music Hall and minstrel entertainers.

The song might be dismissed as a polite middle-class parlour ballad, but it was hugely popular amongst working class audiences. In researching this song I found this interesting eyewitness account of the ballad being sung by miners in Fife in the early 20th century. It was written by American journalist and social reformer Kellogg Durland (fuller versions of his accounts can be found at scottishmining.co.uk):

One of the bottomers, whose business it was to pull the empty hutches from the cages as they reached the bottom and push on the full ones, had a famous tenor voice and to hear his clear musical notes ringing out with distinct sweetness above the crunching, jarring rattle that never ceased for a moment was not to be forgotten. The one-time popular ballad, “White Wings,” thus sung, seemed to express a certain longing for an outlook on a broader world than they, poor cramped miners, knew aught of, as if an innate something was feeling the narrowness of its life and cried out for a boundless freedom. In the abysmal depths of the Aitken Pit 800 men are working out their lives. Their work is labour that costs hard sweat, and though they feel themselves slaves of the lamp …. they extract as much joy from life as they may … the great bottomer sang the words:

Sail home! as straight as an arrow
My yacht shoots along on the crest of the sea.
High up where cliffs they are craggy,
There’s where the girl of my heart waits for me.

Then came the deep-throated chorus from the crowd of rough workers, fairly drowning the boisterous noise of the pit :-

White wings, they never grow weary,
They carry me cheerily over the sea ;
Night comes, I long for my dearie,
I’ll spread out my white wings and sail home to thee.

The song ended, the roar of iron goes on till the signal is given from the pit-head. 

Among the Fife Miners, Kellogg Durland, Blackwoods Magazine 1902

White Wings sung by Bob Hart in 1969 on  Musical Traditions MT CD 301-2  A Broadside (download available from Vaughan Williams Memorial Library)

Sources:

• VWML entry
• Kilgarrif Sing Us
• Lyrics: Wehman Universal Songster No 10 traditionalmusic.co.uk
• Image and Sheet Music: Levy Sheet Music Collection
• Turner and Miall: Just a song at twilight, p79
• Fresno Ballad Index Entry

Last Updated on July 6, 2022 by John Baxter | Published: July 6, 2022