"Run, Nigger, Run" (Roud 3660) is a folk song first documented in 1851. It is known from numerous versions. Responding to the rise of slave patrols in the slave-owning southern United States, the song is about an unnamed black man who attempts to run from a slave patrol and avoid capture. The song was released as a commercial recording several times, beginning in the 1920s, and it was included in the 2013 film 12 Years a Slave .
In the mid-nineteenth century, black slaves were not allowed off their masters' plantations without a pass, for fear that they would rise against their white owners; such uprisings had occurred before, such as the one led by Nat Turner in 1831. However, it remained common for slaves to slip away from the plantations to visit friends elsewhere. If caught, running from the slave patrols was considered better than attempting to explain oneself and facing the whip. This social phenomenon led the slaves to create a variety of songs regarding the patrols and slaves' attempts to escape them. [1] One such song is "Run, Nigger, Run", which was sung on plantations in much of the Southern United States. [2]
It is not certain when the song originated, although John A. Wyeth describes it as one of the oldest of the plantation songs, songs sung by slaves working on Southern plantations. [2] Larry Birnbaum notes lyrical parallels in some versions to earlier songs, such as "Whar You Cum From", first published by J. B. Harper in 1846. [3] According to Newman Ivey White, the earliest written documentation of "Run, Nigger, Run" dates to 1851, when a version was included in blackface minstrel Charlie White's White's Serenaders' Song Book. [1]
After the American Civil War, the song was documented more extensively. Joel Chandler Harris included a version of it in his Uncle Remus and His Friends (1892), and in 1915, E. C. Perrow included a version with his article "Songs and Rhymes from the South" in The Journal of American Folklore . Dorothy Scarborough and Ola Lee Gulledge, in their book On the Trail of Negro Folk-songs , included two versions, collected from two different states, and in his book American Negro Folk-Songs (1928), Newman Ivey White includes four different variations. [4] Folklorist Alan Lomax recorded folk versions from at least two different sources, one in 1933 from a black prisoner named Moses Platt, and another in 1937 from a white fiddler named W. H. Stepp. [3]
Commercial recordings of the song began in the 1920s, many by white singers. In 1924, Fiddlin' John Carson recorded his version of the song. By the end of the decade at least another three recordings had been produced, by Uncle Dave Macon (1925), Gid Tanner and the Skillet Lickers (1927), and Dr. Humphrey Bate and His Possum Hunters (1928). [3]
In 2013 the song was used in 12 Years a Slave , Steve McQueen's film adaptation of the memoir by Solomon Northup. In the film, a white carpenter named John Tibeats (portrayed by Paul Dano) leads a group of slaves in a rendition of the song. Hermione Hoby of The Guardian described the scene as "nauseating", [5] and Dana Stevens of Slate found it to be "hideous". [6] Kristian Lin of the Fort Worth Weekly wrote that, though the song had initially been used by black slaves to encourage escapees and warn them of the dangers involved, when performed by the character of Tibeats it became a taunt, "like a prison guard who jingles the keys for the prisoners to hear, reminding them of what they don't have". [7]
Various versions of the song exist, though all focus on a (usually unnamed) black person running away from, or to avoid, slave patrols (referred to as a "patter-rollers" or "patty-rollers" in the song). [8] The White's Serenaders' Song Book version is presented as a narrative, with both sung and spoken parts. In this version, the evader is caught temporarily, but escapes at great speed after he "left my heel tied round de tree". [9]
Scarborough and Gulledge record a later version as follows:
Run, nigger, run; de patter-roller catch you
Run, nigger, run, it's almost day
Run, nigger, run, de patter-roller catch you
Run, nigger, run, and try to get away
Dis nigger run, he run his best
Stuck his head in a hornet's nest
Jumped de fence and run fru the paster
White man run, but nigger run faster [10]
Some versions of this song include events which occur to the slave during his escape. A version recorded in Louisiana, for instance, has the escapee losing his Sunday shoe while running, while another version has the black man lose his wedding shoe. In other versions, the runner is described as tearing his shirt in half. Still others have the runner point out another slave, one who is hiding behind a tree, in an effort to distract his pursuer. [11] E. C. Perrow records the following verses, found in Virginia:
Es I was runnin' through de fiel',
A black snake caught me by de heel.
Run, nigger, run, de paterrol ketch yuh!
Run, nigger, run! It's almos' day!
Run, nigger, run! I run my bes'
Run my head in a hornet's nes'.
Run, nigger, run! [12]
White finds parallels between "Run, Nigger, Run" and African-American spiritual songs, in which themes of a hunted person running, seeking a place of safety and asylum, were common. These themes, he writes, may be derived from the sermons of slavemasters and campfire songs sung by groups of slaves. White records one song from North Carolina with the refrain "Run, sinner, run, an' hunt you a hidin' place", repeated as in "Run, Nigger, Run". [13] He likewise finds a "psychological connection" between this song and a spiritual often called "City of Refuge", which features the refrain
They had to run, they had to run
They had to run to the City of Refuge
They had to run. [1]
The act of running itself is a common theme in slave literature and folklore, taking both literal and metaphorical forms. The ability for blacks to run faster than whites was considered of such importance that a common proverb of the time went "What you don' hab in yo' haid, yuh got ter' hab in yo' feet". [14] Slave folksongs praised blacks for their running capabilities, comparing them to "a greasy streak o' lightning" or stating that one "ought to see that preacher [nigger, man] run". [15] The black runner's ability to escape white pursuers is rarely in doubt, and consequentially the escape is ultimately successful. These conventions carried over, through the slave narrative genre, into written African-American literature. [14]
American folklore encompasses the folklores that have evolved in the present-day United States since Europeans arrived in the 16th century. While it contains much in the way of Native American tradition, it is not wholly identical to the tribal beliefs of any community of native people.
Mojo, in the African-American spiritual practice called Hoodoo, is an amulet consisting of a flannel bag containing one or more magical items. It is a "prayer in a bag", or a spell that can be carried with or on the host's body. Alternative American names for the mojo bag include gris-gris bag, hand, mojo hand, conjure hand, lucky hand, conjure bag, trick bag, tricken bag, root bag, toby and jomo. The making of mojo bags in Hoodoo is a system of African-American occult magic. The creation of mojo bags is an esoteric system that involves sometimes housing spirits inside of bags for either protection, healing, or harm and to consult with spirits. Other times mojo bags are created to manifest results in a person's life such as good-luck, money or love.
Joel Chandler Harris was an American journalist, fiction writer, and folklorist best known for his collection of Uncle Remus stories. Born in Eatonton, Georgia, where he served as an apprentice on a plantation during his teenage years, Harris spent most of his adult life in Atlanta working as an associate editor at The Atlanta Constitution.
"Turkey in the Straw" is an American folk song that first gained popularity in the 19th century. Early versions of the song were titled "Zip Coon", which were first published around 1834 and performed in minstrel shows, with different people claiming authorship of the song. The melody of "Zip Coon" later became known as "Turkey in the Straw"; a song titled "Turkey in de Straw" with different music and lyrics was published in 1861 together with the wordless music of "Zip Coon" added at the end, and the title "Turkey in the Straw" then became linked to the tune of "Zip Coon".
Slave patrols—also known as patrollers, patterrollers, pattyrollers or paddy rollers—were organized groups of armed men who monitored and enforced discipline upon slaves in the antebellum U.S. southern states. The slave patrols' function was to police enslaved persons, especially those who escaped or were viewed as defiant. They also formed river patrols to prevent escape by boat.
Follow the Drinking Gourd is an African-American folk song first published in 1928. The Drinking Gourd is another name for the Big Dipper asterism. Folklore has it that enslaved people in the United States used it as a point of reference so they would not get lost. According to legend, the song was used by a conductor of the Underground Railroad, called Peg Leg Joe, to guide some fugitive slaves. While the song may possibly refer to some lost fragment of history, the origin and context remain a mystery. A more recent source challenges the authenticity of the claim that the song was used to help slaves escape to the North and to freedom.
"Cotton-Eyed Joe" is a traditional American country folk song popular at various times throughout the United States and Canada, although today it is most commonly associated with the American South. The song is also an instrumental banjo and bluegrass fiddle standard.
"On Top of Old Smoky" is a traditional folk song of the United States. As recorded by The Weavers, the song reached the pop music charts in 1951. It is catalogued as Roud Folk Song Index No. 414.
"Jimmy Crack Corn" or "Blue-Tail Fly" is an American song which first became popular during the rise of blackface minstrelsy in the 1840s through performances by the Virginia Minstrels. It regained currency as a folk song in the 1940s at the beginning of the American folk music revival and has since become a popular children's song. Over the years, several variants have appeared.
The term Creole music is used to describe both the early folk or roots music traditions of rural Creoles of Louisiana.
"Wade in the Water" is an African American jubilee song, a spiritual—in reference to a genre of music "created and first sung by African Americans in slavery." The lyrics to "Wade in the Water" were first co-published in 1901 in New Jubilee Songs as Sung by the Fisk Jubilee Singers by Frederick J. Work and his brother, John Wesley Work Jr., an educator at the historically black college in Nashville, Tennessee, Fisk University. Work Jr. (1871–1925)—who is also known as John Work II—spent thirty years collecting, promoting, and reviving the songcraft of the original Fisk Jubilee Singers, which included being a member and director of the Fisk Jubilee Quartet. The Sunset Four Jubilee Singers made the first commercial recording of "Wade in the Water" in 1925—released by Paramount Records. W. E. B. Du Bois called this genre of songs the Sorrow Songs. "Wade in the Water" is associated with songs of the Underground Railroad.
The Legend of Nigger Charley is a 1972 blaxploitation Western film directed by Martin Goldman. The story of a trio of escaped slaves, it was released during the heyday of blaxploitation films. Filmed in Charles City, Virginia, Eve's Ranch, Santa Fe, New Mexico, Jamaica, and Arizona, it received backlash for its controversial title.
The institution of slavery in North America existed from the earliest years of the colonial history of the United States until 1865 when the Thirteenth Amendment permanently abolished slavery throughout the entire United States. It was also abolished among the sovereign Indian tribes in Indian Territory by new peace treaties which the US required after the Civil War.
A house slave was a slave who worked, and often lived, in the house of the slave-owner, performing domestic labor. House slaves performed largely the same duties as all domestic workers throughout history, such as cooking, cleaning, serving meals, and caring for children; however, their slave status could expose them to greater abuses, including physical punishments and use as a sexual slave.
"Take This Hammer" is a prison, logging, and railroad work song, which has the same Roud number as another song, "Nine Pound Hammer", with which it shares verses. "Swannanoa Tunnel" and "Asheville Junction" are similar. Together, this group of songs are referred to as "hammer songs" or "roll songs". Numerous bluegrass bands and singers like Scott McGill and Mississippi John Hurt also recorded commercial versions of this song, nearly all of them containing verses about the legendary railroad worker, John Henry; and even when they do not, writes folklorist Kip Lornell, "one feels his strong and valorous presence in the song".
Invisible churches among enslaved African Americans in the United States were informal Christian groups where enslaved people listened to preachers that they chose without their slaveholder's knowledge. The Invisible churches taught a different message from white-controlled churches and did not emphasize obedience. Some slaves could not contact invisible churches and others did not agree with an invisible church's message but many slaves were comforted by the invisible churches.
"Duncan and Brady", also known as "Been on the Job Too Long", "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star", or simply "Brady", is a traditional murder ballad about the shooting of a policeman, Brady, by a bartender, Duncan. The song's lyrics stemmed from actual events, involving the shooting of James Brady in the Charles Starkes Saloon in St. Louis, Missouri. Harry Duncan was convicted of the murder, and later executed. Originally recorded by Wilmer Watts & his Lonely Eagles in 1929, it has been recorded numerous times, most famously by Lead Belly, also by Judy Henske, Dave Van Ronk, The Johnson Mountain Boys, New Riders of the Purple Sage, David Nelson Band, and Bob Dylan.
"Roll, Jordan, Roll", also "Roll, Jordan", is a spiritual created by enslaved African Americans, developed from a song written by Isaac Watts in the 18th century which became well known among slaves in the United States during the 19th century. Appropriated as a coded message for escape, by the end of the American Civil War it had become known through much of the eastern United States. In the 19th century, it helped inspire blues, and it remains a staple in gospel music.
Eber Carle Perrow was a professor of English in the United states who wrote about the literary history of the last will and testament and southern folk songs. His writings on folk songs were influential.
On the Trail of Negro Folk-Songs is a non-fiction book by Dorothy Scarborough. It was first published in 1925. The book, a survey of African American folk songs, has been reprinted several times.