Round Her Neck She Wears a Yeller Ribbon

. . . For her lover who is fur, fur away, 1917.
words and music by George A. Norton


The sheet music:


Accompaniment by James Pitt-Payne:


Lyrics

  1. Susie Simpkins in the village papers
    Read about the soldiers manly capers
    And made up her mind
    That a soldier’s bonnie bride she’d be
    Volunteers were called a little later
    Big Si Hubbard stopped a-hoeing ‘taters
    Fell right into line
    And mustered with a company
    She cried and kissed him when he marched away
    And she vowed to keep him in her mind each day

Chorus
‘Round her neck she wears a yeller ribbon
She wears it in the winter and the summer so they say
If you ask her, “Why the decoration?”
She’ll say, “It’s fur my lover who is fur, fur away
Fur away (fur away), fur away (fur away)”
If she is milkin’ cows or mowin’ hay
‘Round her neck she wears a yeller ribbon
She wears it fur her lover who is fur, fur away

  1. Months rolled by and patiently she waited
    Read the war news, greatly agitated
    No word from her boy
    ‘Till a letter from his Captain said
    “Your Beau Silas, he went out a-gunnin'”
    Soon he had the enemy a-runnin’
    Susie wept for joy
    Though further on the letter read
    “The enemy can run some you can bet
    But they couldn’t capture Si, he’s runnin’ yet”

Sung here by Fred Feild: