Bound for Botany Bay - Australian Folk Song

Details

Description

The song 'Botany Bay' or 'Bound for Botany Bay' can be traced back to the British musical 'Little Jack Sheppard', staged at the Gaiety Theatre, London, England, in 1885 and in Melbourne, Australia, in 1886. The show was written by Henry Pottinger Stephens and William Yardley, with music composed and arranged by Wilhelm Meyer Lutz. The show's programme credits "Botany Bay" as "Old Air arr. Lutz". Sheet music from Allan & Co. in Australia credits Florian Pascal, the pseudonym of Joseph Williams Jr. (1847–1923), a music publisher and composer who published the show's music. Pascal composed other numbers in the score but received no credit for "Botany Bay" in the programme.

The song's earlier history is less clear. A song "Botany Bay", catalogued by the British Library as from the 1780s and described as "sung by the Anacreontic Society", has no obvious connection, being concerned with Cook's landing rather than the subsequent deportation of convicts. However, the song's verses have lines in common with Farewell to Judges and Juries which had been performed in 1820. As for the melody, The Era (London) of 25 October 1890 describes it as "written over a hundred years ago", and it appears to have been adapted from the folk song "Mush, Mush", with its refrain "Mush, mush, mush, turaliaddy! Sing, mush, mush, mush, turalia!".

The song became popular in Australia and is seen today as a Australian folk song.

Performed by John Williamson.

Images:

A view near Woolwich in Kent, showing the employment of the convicts for the prison hulks.

The convict transport ship 'PITT' by Thomas Whitcombe, 1793.

Convicts on their way to Botany Bay by Richard Caton Woodville.

The First Fleet entering Sydney Cove by Frank Allen.

The First Fleet in Botany Bay, 1788 by Charles Robert Booth.

The Founding of Australia, 1788 by Algernon Talmage.