Murder of Maria Marten

Lyrics

[Part I] [Verse 1] 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 [Verse 2] He straight went home and fetched his gun His pickaxe and his spade He went unto the Red Barn And there he dug her grave [Part II] [Verse 1] Come, all you thoughtless young men A warning take by me To think upon my unhappy fate To be hanged upon a tree [Verse 2] My name is William Corder To you I do declare I courted Maria Marten Both beautiful and fair [Verse 3] I promised I would marry her Upon a certain day Instead of that, I was resolved To take her life away [Part III] [Verse 1] I went unto her father's house The eighteenth day of May And said, "My dear Maria We will fix a wedding day" [Verse 2] 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 low [Verse 3] After the horrid deed was done She lay there in her gore Her bleeding, mangled body lay Beneath the Red Barn floor [Verse 4] Now all things being silent Her spirit could not rest She appeared unto her mother Who'd suckled her at her breast [Verse 5] For many a long month or more Her mind being sore oppressed Neither at night nor yet by day Could she take any rest [Verse 6] Her mother's mind being sore disturbed She dreamed it three nights o'er Her daughter she lay murdered Beneath the Red Barn floor [Verse 7] She sent the father to the Barn Where he the ground did thrust And there he found his daughter Lay mingling with the dust [Verse 8] My trial was hard, I could not stand Most woeful was the sight When her dear bones was brought to proof Which pierced my heart quite [Verse 9] Her aged father standing by Likewise, his loving wife And in her grief, her hair she tore She scarcely could keep life [Outro] 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 by With pity look on me For murdering of that young girl I was hung upon a tree