On 17 Nov 2006 02:40:17 -0800, ":-D" hotmail.co.uk> wrote:

You're not seriously telling me that you think that TFOA is the first
song to be written about the famine? FFS, you are! What a fecking
eejit you are.

Just for you Jim I'll remind you of my previous post on this hoax
culled from a number of different sources at the Digital Tradition
Folksong Database http://www.mudcat.org/

Subject: RE: Fields of Athenry
From: John Moulden
Date: 11 Mar 00 - 05:58 AM

It's clear that the "original" "1888" version, if genuine, obviates
Pete St John's claim to authorship. However, the website which has the
"broad sheet words" makes it clear that these were posted in a
newsgroup and that no-one involved in posting the information has
actually seen the ballad sheet; I haven't, in thirty years of looking
at such things in the libraries all over Ireland and in Britain. Nor
is the name "Devlin" familiar to me as a Dublin ballad sheet printer.
Another point is that dates are very seldom given on ballad sheets and
they are difficult to date - especially not to a particular year.

I'm going to check on all these details but I would be very surprised
if I find anything to suggest that this posting in a newsgroup was not
a hoax, or a fraudulent attempt to muddy a copyright issue.

Subject: RE: Fields of Athenry
From: GUEST,Martin Ryan
Date: 12 Mar 00 - 04:49 PM

I'm with John Moulden on this one - I smell a rat! Mind you, there is
another Athenry fields song - but unrelated.

Subject: RE: Fields of Athenry
From: Barry T
Date: 09 May 00 - 08:53 PM

I relayed to John Moulden the newsgroup source (1996 thread in the
Harp Digest) that made reference to the early publishing. I don't know
if John actually tried to track down the authors in that thread.

Subject: RE: Fields of Athenry
From: John Moulden
Date: 10 May 00 - 04:09 PM

I have managed to track down the author of the original posting in the
harp-list and have indicated my scepticism. He insists that he saw the
song in some kind of folio song collection, printed by Devlin of
Dublin and that the book is owned by the family of someone he used to
play music with. Hoewever he has no more than the copy of the words he
made.

He was a little testy at being questioned about this and it would not
be possible to elicit any more. However, I am in no way convinced,
I'll be in Dublin on three occasions in the next two weeks and any
references to Devlin will be fully checked - starting with the Street
Directories and then with ER McClintock Dix's bibliographies - this is
my field - and I'm almost prepared to wager that I'll find nothing to
support this contention.

Subject: RE: Fields of Athenry
From: John Moulden
Date: 19 May 00 - 06:39 AM

I've now made searches as I said I would; all is negative.
The assertion is that the Fields of Athenry was printed in 1888 in
Dublin by someone called Devlin.

1. There is nobody of the name Devlin listed among:
Printers (letterpress or photolithographic)
publishers
booksellers
Music Sellers
musical instument makers or dealers
music and pianoforte warehouses
print sellers
in the city or county of Dublin in Thom's Directory for 1887, 1888 or
1889

2. The catalogues of the two major collections of Irish Books made in
the 19th Century - Bradshaw and Gilbert have no printer or publisher
of that name listed.

3. There is no Devlin given in John A Parkinson: Victorian Music
Publishers (Harmonie Park Press, Michigan, 1990) (Detroit studies in
music bibliography no 64) which used the catalogues of the British
Library, the National Libraries of Ireland, Scotland and Wales, the
University Libraries of Oxford and Cambridge and also used the annual
Musical Directory (1853 - 1931).

Subject: RE: Fields of Athenry
From: John Moulden
Date: 21 May 00 - 06:35 PM

: I did further search in the 1887,88,89 Thom's Directories - I like to be
comprehensive (and fair) and remembered that printers, especially of
Music were sometimes engravers - and on copper plate - however there
was no Devlin among Copperplate Printers or among Engravers in Dublin
at those dates.

Subject: RE: Fields of Athenry
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 10:40 AM

John: if you read the rest of this thread and follow up some of the
links given, you'll find that your question has been quite
comprehensively dealt with already, at any rate so far as has been
possible. The site you mention gives no provenance for the "original"
text, and presumably got it from either Lesley Nelson's site (from
which it has now been removed as of dubious authenticity) or from the
original newsgroup posting referred to above. John Moulden is an
expert in his field, and in the absence of new, proven information,
his comments should be taken as definitive.

Subject: RE: Fields of Athenry
From: MartinRyan
Date: 28 Mar 01 - 11:22 AM

John
In a nutshell, so far, there is no evidence to suggest that this is
anything other than a Pete St. John composition.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Hills of Athenrye?
From: Noreen
Date: 28 Feb 05 - 10:49 AM

The links above no longer work because they linked to hoax information
claiming that The Fields of Athenry was a much older song than it
really is.

Read the following thread: Fields of Athenry for further information,
including the following:
The song was written by Pete St. John and was published in 1985 by
Walton Mnf. Ltd., Dublin

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Hills of Athenrye?
From: GUEST,Martin Ryan
Date: 28 Feb 05 - 02:17 PM

We've been through this one thoroughly before. Pete St. John wrote the
song. There was a suggestion of an earlier version - which appears to
be fake. There is/was also another song called "The Fields of
Athenry", a.k.a. The Clarin's Mossy Banks, written as a reaction to
Pete's song.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: The Hills of Athenrye?
From: George Seto - af221@chebucto.ns.ca
Date: 28 Feb 05 - 04:01 PM

Pauline L, the link is found in Noreen's posting. The thread discusses
the issue of a web-page which had this song which seemed to be very
similar to that we know and love as the Fields of Athenry. Slight
changes to names, and things, but it claimed to be written in the
1880s. John Moulden checked out a number of the "facts" of that page,
but was unable to confirm any one of them. It was declared to be a
hoax when the page was "lost" after someone tried to contact the
person who had put up the web-page. That's the simple story.