Change your tune
Students listen to and scrutinise the song Botany Bay and rewrite the lyrics to reflect our nation’s history.
This is the student activity 1 of 7 of the Journey of the First Fleet learning activity.
Change your tune
One of the songs we imagine convicts singing on the journey to the new colony was in fact written nearly 100 years later.
Listen to the traditional folk song Botany Bay. Find a version online.
This song was performed in a theatre in England in 1885, 45 years after the last convicts were sent to NSW. (The last convicts sent to Australia arrived in Western Australia in 1868.) It is probably based on an earlier song that was sung in England in the 1820s.
Read the lyrics we have chosen. Interestingly, there are no official lyrics and some very different versions of this song.
Botany Bay
Farewell to old England forever,
Farewell to my rum culls as well,
Farewell to the well known Old Bailey,
Where I used for to cut such a swell.
Chorus:
Singing too-ra-li oo-ra-li add-it-y,
Too-ra-li oo-ra-li ay,
Too-ra-li oo-ra-li add-it-y,
We're bound for the Botany Bay.
There's the captain as is our commander,
There's the bosun and all the ship's crew,
There's the first and the second class passengers,
Knows what we poor convicts go through.
'Taint leaving old England we cares about,
'Taint cause we mis-spells what we knows,
But because all we light-fingered gentry
Hops around with a log on our toes.
For seven long years I'll be staying here,
For seven long years and a day,
All for meeting a cove in an alley,
And taking his ticker away.
Oh, had I the wings of a turtle dove,
I'd soar on my pinions so high,
Slap bang to the arms of my Polly love,
And in her sweet presence I'd die.
So come all you young Dookies and Duchesses,
Take warning from what I've to say,
Mind all is your own as you touch-es-es,
Or you'll join us in Botany Bay.
Read these suggested translations:
cull means a friend or mate but a rum cull has a few definitions but could be - a foolish rich man easily tricked
swell means a gentleman or a rich man so cut such a swell may mean to appear rich
light-fingered gentry means thieving upper class people
log on our toes means to wear a ball and chain around your ankle as a punishment
cove means a man, for example, a buz-cove is a pickpocket
ticker means watch so taking his ticker away means to steal his watch
dookies means dukes.
Some of these words are part of the flash language which was a set of secret slang words spoken by the criminal class in London at the time of the First Fleet. [For more information on flash language see Flash Language in the Talkin’ Like A Convict learning activity.]
Define any other words you don’t know.
Look at the images of the First Fleet in Botany Bay.
Answer these questions:
- The song says the convicts are bound for Botany Bay, where did they finally end up? Why?
- Were there first and second class passengers on the First Fleet?
- What was the man’s crime in the song? What was his sentence?
- Were most convicts thieving upper class people?
- Is there anything in the song that sounds about right in terms of the convict experience?
- Is there anything missing?
- Is this song a primary source of information? Why/Why not?
- What parts would you like to rewrite?
Here’s your chance! Using the same tune rewrite the rhyming lyrics to this song that reflects our current view of the First Fleet and arrival in the colony. Use a rhyming dictionary to help you with the new lyrics. You might like to consider the truth of the First Fleet journey, the actual destination, how convicts might have really been feeling, the mischief and mishaps that happened onboard and importantly, on whose country they landed. Don’t forget to change the title and those words in the chorus too!
A challenge: Can you include the term terra nullius in the song plus comment on how incorrect it was?
Record your version of the song by having some talented musicians in your class play the music and the rest of the class singing your new lyrics. Perhaps perform your song at your school assembly.
Extension work: Create an animation for your song’s recording. Use some images of the collection items from the State Library of NSW.
Teachers: You could start with this Botany Bay song task and work on it intermittently throughout the whole unit of work and finish with a performance. Alternatively, it may be a worthwhile conclusion to the complete unit of work on the First Fleet.