"Old Polina"

No personal notes.

There is nothing from the usual sources (hence I have had to transcribe the abc file by hand) - however, we do have a fair bit of discussion, as well as lyrics, from the Mudcat Cafe;

A CD recording I have of The Old Polina states that the Newfoundland song "The Old Polina" comes from "The Old Balena", described as "an old English whaling song." (Hence, one assumes, "Balena" which makes much more sense for the name of a whaling ship.)

THE OLD POLINA

There's a noble fleet of Whalers, a sailing from Dundee
Manned by British sailors, to take them o'er the sea
On a western ocean passage, we started on the trip
And we flew along, just like a song in our gallant whaling ship.

CHORUS
For the wind was on her quarter, and the engines working free
There's not another whaler, that sails the Arctic Sea
Can beat the Old Polina, you need not try me sons
For we challenged all, both great and small, from Dundee to St. John's.

'Twas the second Sunday morning, just after leaving port
We met a heavy Sou'West gale that washed away our boat
It washed away our quarter deck, our stanchions just as well
And so we set the whole she-bang a-floating in the gale
[Note: some sing "a-floating off to hell"]

[chorus again]

Art Jackman set his canvas, Fairweather got up steam
And Captain Guy, the darling bye, came plunging through the stream
And Mullins in the "Husky" tried to beat the blooming lot
But to beat The Old Polina was something he could not

[chorus again]

There's the noble "Terra Nova", a model without doubt
The "Arctic" and "Aurora" they talk so much about
Art Jackman's model mail boat -- the terror of the sea
Tried to beat the "Old Polina" on a passage from Dundee

[chorus again]

And now we're back in old St. John's, where rum is very cheap
So we'll drink a health to Captain Guy who brought us o'er the deep
A health to all our sweethearts and to our wives so fair
Not another ship could make the trip with the "Polina" I declare.

[chorus again]

Yes, the song is a Newfoundland song, but the ship's name (says Edith Fowke, Penguin Book of Canadian Folk Songs) is the Polynia, launched 1861, a 472-tonner owned by Dundee Seal and Whale Fishing Company. It was commanded by Capt. William Guy from 1883 until it was lost in Davis Strait 10 July 1891, being crushed between two ice floes in a gale. Fowke got the song from Doyle (Old-Time Songs and Poetry of Newfoundland, 1955 ed.), and it's also mentioned in Paul Mercer's "Newfoundland Songs and Ballads in Print 1842-1974" and Michael Taft's "A Regional Discography of Newfoundland and Labrador 1904-1972", both lovely books from Memorial U. Folklore dept. JB

And for your etymological digression, I wonder if Polynia is a spelling of "polynya", an area of open water in sea ice, from Russian polyn'ya. If so it was a new word then--Merriam-Webster On Line gives the first use in English as 1853. And the pronunciation changed, as the Newfoundland tape I've heard pronounced it to rhyme with "Carolina". And the fate of the ship was ironic. TJ

EDITOR'S NOTE: I included the commentaries in hope that they'd be a reminder of the difficulties of establishing historical truth of folksonsgs. Also of the futility of relying on proper names. I've seen it spelled Baleena, Balena, Balina, Polina and Balaena. Go figure. RG