Best viewed in
Internet Explorer

Music (PDF)

Music (BMW)

Back to


Updated 06/10/2019

The Irish Washerwoman

Also known as An Bhean Níocháin Éireannach, The Big, Corporal Casey, Do Virgins Taste Better?, Haste To The Wedding, The Irish Woman, The Wash Woman, The Washing Woman, The Irish Washerwoman is a traditional jig known to have been played throughout the British Isles, and in North America. Although usually considered an Irish tune, some scholars claim that it is English in origin, derived from the seventeenth century tune "Dargason".  This jig was incorporated as the first movement of the "Irish Suite", a collection of traditional tunes arranged for orchestra by American composer Leroy Anderson in 1946.

Lyrics

When I was at home I was merry and frisky,
My dad kept a pig and my mother sold whisky,
My uncle was rich, but never would by aisey
Till I was enlisted by Corporal Casey.
Och! rub a dub, row de dow, Corporal Casey,
My dear little Shelah, I thought would run crazy,
When I trudged away with tough Corporal Casey.  

I marched from Kilkenny, and, as I was thinking
On Shelah, my heart in my bosom was sinking,
But soon I was forced to look fresh as a daisy,
For fear of a drubbing from Corporal Casey.
Och! rub a dub, row de dow, Corporal Casey!
The devil go with him, I ne'er could be lazy,
He struck my shirts so, ould Corporal Casey.  

We went into battle, I took the blows fairly
That fell on my pate, but they bothered me rarely,
And who should the first be that dropped, why, and please ye,
It was my good friend, honest Corporal Casey.
Och! rub a dub, row de dow, Corporal Casey!
Thinks I you are quiet, and I shall be aisey,
So eight years I fought without Corporal Casey.