Sacramento – Shanties Family

List of the Bound for the Rio Grande – Shanties Family

  1. Sacramento (A)
  2. Sacramento (B)
  3. Sacramento (C)
  4. Sacramento (D)
  5. Sacramento – Norvegian English worded version
  6. Sacramento – Version from German barque Gustav

Interesting Facts about the Bound for the Sacramento – Shanties Family

Sacramento – Shanties Family was sung as a capstan anchor shanty, especially when raising the “mud-hook”. The origin of this shanty has many controversies. Due to tune, form, and “Hoodah” or “Doodah” chorus, it has long been associated with Stephen Foster’s “Camptown Races”. C. F. Smith claims this shanty came after the minstrel ditty, it is very curious that a new set of words should have been fitted to the chorus of “Camptown Races”, while it was still a new song.

The capstan it was a vertical-axled rotating machine developed for use on sailing ships to multiply the pulling force of seamen when hauling ropes. The capstan was used for multiple pulling (heaving) jobs, but raising the capstan was the heaviest job so the tempo was the slowest used on capstans. Below image of the capstan working on its sailors.

crew in front of the capstan

My private collection of books

Shantyman library –  you will see descriptions and recommendations of positions worth diving into, true sources of knowledge about sea shanties. To gain knowledge about sea shanties is the main ultimate purpose of this library, every book in this library is somehow related to sea shanties and before mast songs.

More involvement in Traditional Sea Shanties

You can find this record here or directly listen below. If you want to discuss the record or share your opinion you can do it in my Facebook forum here.