Richmond Is A Hard Road To Travel: A Song History

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“Richmond Is a Hard Road to Travel” is a Confederate satire published in 1863, with words attributed to John R. Thompson,[1] who had edited the literary journal Southern Literary Messenger from 1847 until 1860.[2] The song ridicules, one after another, the Union generals whose campaigns against the Confederate capital had come to nothing.[3] The sheet music, entered for copyright by Blackmar & Co. in the Confederate court for the District of Georgia, is dedicated to the Union general Ambrose E. Burnside, and its verses allude to George McClellan’s use of observation balloons and to Burnside’s defeat at Fredericksburg.[1]

1863 photograph looking across the Rappahannock River to the town of Fredericksburg, Virginia

Attributed to Andrew Joseph Russell, View Across Rappahannock River to Fredericksburg, Virginia, photograph, February 1863. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Public domain (CC0).

Thompson borrowed the tune of “Jordan Is a Hard Road to Travel,”[1] a song credited to Dan Emmett and written for a New York blackface minstrel show in 1853.[4][5] Emmett may have reworked an older song by giving it topical verses, and later performers went on changing its lines to suit the news, a habit Thompson’s parody continued.[4] Apart from its words, the “Jordan” melody also lived on as an instrumental, turning up in Elias Howe’s Musician’s Omnibus in 1862 and in later collections of old-time fiddle repertoire.[6]

The Richmond song found new listeners during the folk revival, when the New Lost City Ramblers, with Tom Paley singing lead over fiddle, banjo and guitar, recorded it for the Folkways album Songs of the Civil War, compiled by Irwin Silber; the album notes point out that the original printing held far more verses than the recording uses.[3][7] Bobby Horton later included it on Homespun Songs of the C.S.A., Volume 4 (1988).[8]

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Sources

  1. Smithsonian Libraries and Archives: "Richmond is a hard road to travel" (catalog record, 1863 sheet music).
  2. Encyclopedia Virginia: "Southern Literary Messenger".
  3. Smithsonian Folkways: "Songs of the Civil War" (FH 5717 liner notes).
  4. Mainly Norfolk: "Jordan / Take Off Your Old Coat (Roud 2103)".
  5. Wikipedia: "Jordan Is a Hard Road to Travel".
  6. The Traditional Tune Archive: "Jordan is a Hard Road to Travel".
  7. Smithsonian Folkways: "Richmond Is a Hard Road to Travel" (The New Lost City Ramblers).
  8. Bobby Horton (Bandcamp): "Richmond is a Hard Road to Travel".