Jack Hall / Sam Hall: a murder ballad in two versions
“Jack Hall” is an earlier version of the more famous and rowdy “Sam Hall”, which everyone has sung, from Frank Tovey to Johnny Cash. (Also check out Josh White's amazing cover.) The song is supposedly about a real life robber who was hanged in ~1700, but it's debatable if he was a Jack or a Sam, a thief or a highwayman or a killer. An early 19th century broadside gives a rather comical account, where Jack the chimney sweep steals chamber pots and sells “candles short of weight” – but he dies on the gallows all the same. A 1905 source tells us the following:
The facts regarding the hero are these. Jack Hall was a chimney sweeper, who was executed for burglary in 1701. He had been sold when a child to a chimney sweeper for a guinea and was quite a young man when Tyburn claimed him. There can be no question that the song “Jack Hall,” in some form or other, was known as early as 1719... About 1845-50 a comic singer named G. W. Ross revived the song under the name “Sam Hall,” with an added coarseness not in the original. He sang it, according to a small song-book “The Sam Hall Songster,” “for upwards of 400 nights,” and I believe other singers followed suit, sometimes introducing on the “concert-room platform a gallows and a halter.”
I have taken down four versions of “Jack Hall” in Somerset. With the exception of that given in the text the tunes are all variants of the “Admiral Benbow” air. The metre, in which each of these two ballads is cast, is so unusual that we must assume that one of them was written in imitation of the other. As Jack Hall was executed in 1701, i.e., the year before Admiral Benbow was killed, it is possible that “Jack Hall” is the earlier of the two.
I think that the “Admiral Benhow” tune mentioned here is the same with “Captain Kidd”. The Dubliners’ version is most close to that one, melody-wise, and there are similar structures in the lyrics too. They sing of “Sam Hall” but it’s the earlier, non-rowdy version.
Basically, we have two names (Jack and Sam), two basic melodies (Captain Kidd’s and... the other one), and two sets of lyrics (one sombre and stoic, and one that screams bloody murder at cops and priests and society). I mean we don’t have only two, we have a fuckton of variants, but these are the most prominent ones in contemporary recordings. And how they are combined varies. It’s a mess.
Back to the real Jack, if there even was one, the Newgate Calendar does have a Jack Hall entry, but that one wasn’t a chimney sweep, and the worst thing he did was threaten a kid during a burglary. He was hanged at Tyburn in 1707.
But in the song, this early version of the song, Jack Hall robs lords and ladies gay on the King’s highway. I guess that’s more exciting.
Robinson, O'Dwyer, Kelly - Jack Hall
Oh my name it is Jack Hall, chimney sweep, chimney sweep Oh my name it is Jack Hall, chimney sweep Oh my name it is Jack Hall and I've robbed both great and small And my neck shall pay for all when I die, when I die And my neck shall pay for all when I die
All on the King's highway, night and day, night and day All on the King's highway, night and day All on the King's highway I've robbed lords and ladies gay And my neck shall pay for all when I die, when I die And my neck shall pay for all when I die
I've a hundred pounds in store, that's no joke, that's no joke I've a hundred pounds in store, that's no joke I've a hundred pounds in store and I'll rob a hundred more And my neck shall pay for all when I die, when I die And my neck shall pay for all when I die
At the trial they told me, "You shall die. You shall die." At the trial they told me, "You shall die." Then they sent me off to gaol where no more I'll drink strong ale And my neck shall pay for all when I die, when I die And my neck shall pay for all when I die
Well I rode up Tyburn Hill in a cart, in a cart Oh I rode up Tyburn Hill in a cart Oh I rode up Tyburn Hill, it was there I made my will For the best of friends must part; fare you well, fare you well For the best of friends must part; fare you well
Up the ladder I did grope, that's no joke, that's no joke Up the ladder I did grope, that's no joke Up the ladder I did grope when the hangman spread his rope But ne'er a word I spoke tumbling down, tumbling down But ne'er a word I spoke tumbling down
