Follow me up to Carlow

Eugene Dunphy travels back to 19th century Dublin and to 16th century Wicklow.

Glenmalure, County Wicklow

Dublin was bathed in sunshine on Saturday, the 22nd of May 1897, the day when seven pipers assembled at the Leinster Lecture Hall in Molesworth Street. Two of the pipers had little trouble getting to the venue, being already based in Dublin, but the other five had travelled from Donegal, Galway, Cork, Roscommon, and Wicklow. They were there for two reasons; to win a prize for the best unpublished tune, and to record their tunes onto wax cylinders by way of a phonograph machine. The prize money for the unpublished tune category was raised by Dublin-born Patrick Joseph (‘PJ’) McCall (1861-1919), a prolific writer and poet whom, apart from being a credible fiddle-player, took a deep interest in Irish history.

The first prize of £3 was awarded to Donegal piper Turlogh McSweeney, the second to Dublin man John Flanagan, who played a slow air followed by a rollicking war tune called ‘Follow me up to Carlow’. Why McCall was smitten by the latter melody may have something to do with the fact that he had heard it about two years earlier in Wexford, or maybe it reminded him of his father, John, who was born in Clonmore, County Carlow. Whatever the case, McCall was so smitten by the tune, he set about writing what was to become one of the most popular ballads in the Irish folk song tradition.

                        P. J. McCall (left) and piper John Flanagan

Follow me up to Carlow was first published in 1899, in McCall’s Songs of Erinn, but under the title ‘Marching Song of Feagh MacHugh; The Firebrand of the Mountains, AD 1580’, the introductory note reading as follows: ‘It is tradition that this air (‘Follow me up to Carlow’) was performed by the pipers of Feagh MacHugh as he marched to attack Carlow after his victory over Lord Deputy Grey at Glenmalure’.

McCall’s prowess for turning history into verse was already well established. By way of marking the centenary of the 1798 Rebellion, he wrote ‘Boolavogue’ and ‘Kelly the boy from Killane’, rousing ballads which paid homage to the United Irishmen of Wexford, hardly surprising since his mother Elizabeth (nee Newport) was a proud, historically aware woman from Rathangan, County Wexford.

Not many writers could condense various episodes of the Tudor conquest of Ireland into three verses and a chorus, but this is what McCall set out to achieve, and achieve it he did. Follow me up to Carlowspeaks of a memorable battle fought on the 25th of August 1580, at Glenmalure, County Wicklow, between the combined forces of Feagh MacHugh O’Byrne and James Eustace, Viscount Baltinglass of the Pale, and the English forces of Arthur Grey, 14th Baron Grey de Wilton.

But McCall does more than concentrate on actual combat, as can be seen from the opening lines when he alludes to Feagh MacHugh O’Byrne’s brother-in-law, Brian MacCahir Óg Kavanagh, being driven off his land back in 1572, by William Fitzwilliam (‘black Fitzwilliam’), Lord Deputy of Ireland. O’Byrne tells MacCahir Óg not to dwell on the past; not to brood ‘o’er the old disgrace’. McCall portrays the English commander as a cocky individual, hell bent on stopping O’Byrne’s incursions into the Pale, but Grey’s band of 3,000 troops suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of O’Byrne at Glenmalure.

The chorus mentions ‘Lord Kildare’, otherwise known as Gerald Fitzgerald, 11th earl of Kildare, whose forces fought on Grey’s side. McCall then brings antiquated phrases and words into the mix, and has O’Byrne summoning up old grievances as he calls on Fitzwilliam to ‘have a care’, or to draw his sword and prepare to fight. ‘Halbert’, usually spelt ‘halberd’, was a large curved blade attached to a long pole, a particularly lethal weapon on the field of battle. The chorus ends with the cry ‘Follow me up to Carlow’, the inference being that Carlow would be the location for the next rout, where O’Byrne would ‘fly up and teach them manners’.

In the final verse, McCall travels back and forward in time. He mentions Rory Oge O’More, the Gaelic lord of Laois who swore vengeance on English troops serving under Queen Elizabeth (‘Liza’), especially those who took part in the entrapment and massacre of the Gaelic gentry of Laois and Offaly, on New Year’s Day 1577, at Mullaghmast, County Kildare. ‘White is sick’ is a reference to Nicholas White, Seneschal of Wexford who was executed at the Tower of London in 1592, having been found guilty of corruption, and ‘Lane is fled’ is Sir Ralph Lane, the Muster-Master General who died in 1603 as a result of wounds received in 1594, when doing battle against the Irish.

In March 1907, Follow me up to Carlow was sung by the up and coming tenor from Athlone, John McCormack, at the Irish Music Festival, staged by the Gaelic League at Queen’s Hall, London. McCormack’s ‘most effective’ performance prompted The Kerryman to ask, ‘When will national songs of this type displace the rubbish imported from London music halls?’ Decades later, the song was recorded by numerous artistes, including Planxty, Paddy Reilly, Jim McCann, the Wolfe Tones, and the High Kings.

PJ McCall died in March 1919, at ‘Westpoint House’, his home in Sutton, Dublin. In 1954 his old friend, Seán T. O’Kelly, then President of Ireland, unveiled a memorial plaque outside McCall’s former Dublin home at 25 Patrick’s Street, but the plaque was removed in 1988 when the Dublin Corporation announced plans for a road widening project in the area – a ‘Corpo’ spokesman told the Sunday Independent that the memorial would probably be re-erected at St. Patrick’s Park, Dublin, ‘whenever we get around to it’. Plaques aside, it is McCall’s songs that will stand testament to his memory and legacy, and for many years to come.

Follow me up to Carlow as published in 1899 in Songs of Erinn.

Lift MacCahir Óg your face, brooding o’er the old disgrace,

That black Fitzwilliam stormed your place, and drove you to the Fern;

Grey said victory was sure, soon the firebrand he’d secure,

Until he met at Glenmalure, Feagh MacHugh O’Byrne.

Chorus: Curse and swear Lord Kildare, Feagh will do what Feagh will dare,

Now Fitzwilliam, have a care, fallen is your star low;

Up with halbert out with sword, on we go for by the Lord,

Feagh MacHugh has given the word, follow me up to Carlow.

See the swords of Glen Imayle [Glen of Imaal, Wicklow] flashing o’er the English Pale,

See all the children of the Gael beneath O’Byrne’s banners;

Rooster of a fighting stock, would you let a Saxon cock,

Crow out upon an Irish rock?, fly up and teach him manners.

Chorus

From Tassaggart up to Clonmore, flows a stream of Saxon gore,

Oh great is Rory Óg O’More, at sending loons to Hades;

White is sick and Lane is fled, now for black Fitzwilliam’s head,

We’ll send it over dripping red, to Liza and her ladies.

Chorus

See this link to a video of the history of this ballad, made by Eugene Dunphy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDuc-BgZs6s