No doubt the work of a 1960s folksong enthusiast rather than MacNamara. It does however illustrate a continuing tradition of writing songs about past events.
Collected by Ian Coggins from Maeve Chick, Battery Point, Tasmania, 1968.
She sailed form Hobart Town,
Three hundred and thirsty convicts were aboard
All Macquarie Harbour bound were they,
All Macquarie Harbour bound
A life in chains is sorrow for a man
Twere better he were dead,
And sooner than a soldier's mercy show,
The cruel sea will turn red, I swear,
The cruel sea will turn red.
You may plead for pity's blessed sake
But a tyrant's eye is blind
And sooner than a soldier's mercy show,
The cruel sea will turn kind,
I say, The cruel sea will turn kind.
Aboard this ship and loaded down with chains
Was a man named Brian Malone
'Twas he who said now we can take this ship
And sail her away on our own, brave boys,
And sail her away on our own. ,.
The soldiers lined the decks with guns in hand
And they were craven men,
But Brian Malone he pitched them overboard
And the convicts were free men again, at last,
The convicts were free men again.
They set their course and northerly did sail
Far from Van Diemen's Land
And swore that they never again would bow down
Beneath the tyrant's hand, no more,
Beneath the tyrant's hand.
They were lost and never seen again
But when the moonlight fails
The waves ride high and lightning splits the night
They say the Cypress sails, once more,
They say the Cypress sails,
They say the Cypress sails.
From Australian Tradition, March, 1969. 9.
