...or 'Murder in the Red Barn'.
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(Reminds me of a play
I once did the lighting for, at school,
many, many years ago...!)
Murder of Maria Marten
(Confession and Execution of William Corder)
James Catnach (1828)
If you'll meet me at the Red Barn
As sure as I have life
I will take you to Ipswich town
And there make you my wife
This lad went home and fetched his gun
His pickaxe and his spade
He went unto the Red Barn
And there he dug her grave
Come all you thoughtless young men
A warning take by me
To think upon my unhappy fate
To be hanged upon a tree
My name is William Corder
To you I do declare
I courted Maria Marten
Both beautiful and fair
I promised I would marry her
Upon a certain day
Instead of that I was resolved
To take her life away
I went unto her father's house
The eighteenth day of May
And said my dear Maria
We will fix a wedding day
With her heart so light she thought no harm
To meet me she did go
I murdered her all in the barn
And laid her body down
After my horrid deed was done
She laid there in her gore
Her bleeding mangled body
Lay beneath the Red Barn floor
Now all things being silent
Her spirit could not rest
She appeared upon her mother
Consult her at her breast
For many a long month or more
Her mind was sore depressed
No more at night nor at day
Could she take any rest
Her mother's mind being sore disturbed
She dreamed a dream she saw
Her daughter she lay murdered
Beneath the Red Barn floor
She sent the father to the Barn
Where he the ground did thrust
And there he found his daughter
Lay mingling with the dust
My trial was hard, I could not stand
Most horrorful was the sight
When her dear bones was brought to prove
Which pierced my heart wide
Her ancient father standing by
Likewise his loving wife
And in her grief her hair she tore
She scarcely could be tide
Adieu adieu, my loving friends,
My glass is almost run
On Monday next will be my last
When I am to be hung
So all young men who do pass
With pity look on me
For murdering of that young girl
I was hung upon a tree
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