The Ballad of Robert Jeffrey

from Awaken by Windjammer

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about

This is a true story that Fran came across in the ‘Polperro Heritage Museum of Smuggling and Fishing’. Robert Jeffrey (1789-1820) was a young man from the south coast of Cornwall who was pressed into the navy and received extraordinarily disproportionate punishment for dipping into the ship’s stores, but survived to tell the tale. Synthesiser and pitch-shifted accordion are used to contrast the more traditional style of the lyrical content.

lyrics

In Polperro where the winding streets
Meet the wild unyielding Cornish sea
There was a lad born of that coast
Whose name was Robert Jeffrey

In 1807 he was just a boy
And the world he’d barely seen
He was pressed aboard a navy ship
Though he was just seventeen

Captain Warwick Lake was a tyrant fierce
With temper like a blowin’ gale
And he flew into a fit of rage
When Jeffrey was caught stealing the ale

Jeffrey was left on an island bare
Naught but a rock in the blue
With nothing but a knife and a handkerchief
It seemed this island would be his doom

Jeffrey was there for a week or more
Eating eggs and drinking the dew
Until a ship bound for America’s shore
Rolled into view

Jeffrey was borne to Massachusetts
His body was never found
And after three long years word of his tale
Reached the ears of old London town

Captain Warwick Lake was fired in disgrace
Court martialled for his cruelty
And Jeffrey returned to his Polperro home
Safe once more, by the Cornish sea

credits

from Awaken, released April 30, 2022
Jeremy - Vocals, Guitar
Jake - Synthesiser, Backing vocals
Fran - Piano accordion, Backing vocals

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Windjammer Plymouth, UK

Windjammer are a trio who cast timeless stories in a context of their own making. They blend self-penned songs and instrumentals with original, genre-bending arrangements of music drawn from the traditions of British folk.

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