From The
Pen Of Frank Jackman- Down In The Hills And Hollows- “Guide Me O Thou Great
Jehovah”
… he,
Caleb Jones, woke up that early, very early, day break early Sunday morning
with a headache that could have reached clear to Morgantown and that was saying
something since he was not even in that state, West Virginia, but was be-
straddling a twin bed, there was no other way to put it, shared in a room with
Hobart Jones, no relative (no kin as they say in those hills and hollows parts)
at Ma Oates’ roadside inn in downtown Prestonsburg, that’s Kentuck, on that
cold, clear winter morning in the year of our lord 1933. None of which helped him in the least
to explain why his head hurt so badly. He had poked his head around to see if
Hobart had come in, and saw that empty twin bed made
up just as it has been when the boys had hit town the previous afternoon.
That
could only mean one thing, one damn blessed thing, Hobart was right then
sharing some pillow space with that young widow woman, Peggy Radley, whose
husband had been killed in a coal mine accident a couple of years back and who
had eyes for Hobart, from the local gossip, even before the late Mr. Radley
(Pete) went to his great reward. Well, good luck brother, good luck (although
Hobart, six foot four, lanky, muscular lanky, make no mistake, longish blonde
hair and blue eyes, fierce blues, what the women, among themselves, called
bedroom eyes with a titter, and who knows what else, didn’t seem to need luck,
need it where it counted, in the women department).
Of
course Caleb’s own good luck would depend very much that cold crisp morning on
whether he could bestir (nice word he thought) from Ma Oates’ comfortable
bestraddled bed in order to meet Miss Daisy Bailey for the eight o’clock
service at Lord’s Worship Baptist Church. That “date” was to be the prelude to,
perhaps, his own sharing of some pillow space in the very near future with
Daisy, who working as a clerk for the Peabody Mining Company, had her own cozy
apartment (so he had heard) and had the previous night given him every
indication that he might get to see the inside of the place if he proved to be
a good and observant god-praising (maybe fearing too but she specifically said
praising) Christian man.
And
while Miss Daisy Bailey would not give Miss Bette Davis or Miss Gloria Swanson
a run for their money in the looks department she was pretty enough and had
something, something that made Caleb (and a few other Prestonsburg young men,
including bunk mate in absentia Hobart) have some restless mountain wind nights
as he had found out when they got to talking about the local women, local
eligible women. Just that moment though he was
deciding, seriously deciding whether his three thousand pound head could
tolerate Preacher Birch’s long-winded sermons (two per service, Jesus), Daisy
promise or no promise. And then he ran the previous day’s, the previous night’s
really, events through his as he mulled his options.
Once a
month, at least in winter, the good citizens of Prestonsburg gathered together
at Farmer Duane’s old red barn for a Saturday night hoe-down, a dance really.
That event formed the main social calendar for the plain-spoken, plain-living,
god-fearing (and maybe praising too), hard-scrabble farmers and hard-bitten
coal miners who dotted the hills and hollows around the town and had done so
since as far back as anyone could remember (since 1866 he looked it up, started
by the original Farmer Duane just back from war, the Civil War, Yankee side
like most in the hills and hollows around there who hated slavery and nigras in
equal amounts. It was only later that they came to appreciate Mister James Crow
like their other southern brethren). And they would pay, and pay well, to hear
some good old time mountain music to weep over, maybe some funny rural life songs
to laugh over, and some sentimental songs to help the spooning along,
especially late in the evening (pay, by the way, cash money, room and board for
the night at Ma Oates’ inn and throw some liquor in, which is how the inn stay
first got included as part of the arrangements).
Caleb
Jones, no modesty in him when it came to his music, was the best damn, excuse
the language, mandolin player around the valley, and maybe farther. Hobart
Jones (remember, no kin) was the best damn (same on language, okay) fiddle
player around. And so the pair had gotten together with a banjo player, a
mountain harp player, and a bass player (really wash tub but he, Gary White,
played the thing like a big old sad old bass and kept beautiful time to boot)
and formed the Prestonsburg Sheiks (a moniker then in use by every southern
group, and some Yankees too, he had heard the Ohio Sheiks on the radio one
night and they sounded great). And so the previous few months, after Mr.
Griffin from the town council had heard them over in Hazard when the tore the
barn down (figuratively), the Prestonsburg Sheiks were the band for the monthly
red barn dances down at Duane’s farm.
Caleb
then thought about that liquor part of the deal which was the proximate cause
for his big head (and for his now foolish decision to have that damn, don’t
excuse the language, church date. What the hell had he been thinking?) See the
deal was that Ozzie Desmond, the main man moonshiner, would provide the liquor,
white lightning, in dry county Kentuck (everybody
went to Ozzie, no big deal). What happened though was that he and Hobart had
run into Ozzie the previous afternoon early while they were heading for the old
barn to set up and maybe practice a little. Ozzie, knowing his customers, immediately
gave them some jars of his nectar and that was that. Both men, drinkers, but
not hard, hard drinkers were blasted by show time. That night though the liquor
must have had some angelic portion because the band really did blow the place
away (figuratively) with three great sets, song
all mixed up, but really great on Turkey in the Straw, Cripple Creek, Poor
Wayfaring Stranger, Pretty Polly, a salacious version that only the young got
of K. C. Moan, some spooning stuff like Come All You Fair and Tender Maidens,
and Storms Are On The Ocean.
And that
music magic and liquor elixir was how Miss Daisy Bailey was drawn to one Caleb
Jones (and probably why Peggy Radley decided to make her big move on Hobart as
well). During the second set intermission she had come over and started talking
to him about this and that, mainly about some Carter Family covers that they
had just done and that she was thrilled by. One thing had led to another so by
the end of the evening they had agreed that she would wait for him to
pack up and he would walk her home. Easy street, he thought, except wait up.
She, as she made clear on their way to her home, was no pushover, she had been
unlucky in love before, and besides she was looking for someone who was a
church-going man, important in that non-once a month red barn dance kick over
community, especially for a single woman with her own apartment. And so the
test, this date that he was almost positive his head could not take.
About
seven forty-five though after going downstairs to Ma Oates’ kitchen and having
her hair of the dog fix him a raw egg and tomato juice concoction he revived.
He was going, what was he thinking about in not going when he thought about it.
So he trundled himself the six blocks over to Lord’s Worship as Preacher Birch
was greeting one and all, many, many of the men anyway, who looked more beaten
down by that white lightning than he. And there at the entrance he spied Miss
Daisy Bailey all dressed in virgin white, prayer book in one hand and choir
song book in the other. She waved to him, waved kind of non-committedly it
seemed to him, and as they greeted each other she said
that she would see him after the service since she had been drafted as a
replacement in the choir that morning.
A few minutes later he entered the church a little
crestfallen over his decision to keep the date as the choir began to sing with
pious gusto Guide Me O Thou Great Jehovah. He had, not having been in a
church for a long time, heard that song sung so well as this morning. He
thought too that at that hour all over the valley, and beyond as well, that all
the little white churches and all the little nigra churches too, were probably
singing that same praise to Jehovah. Not god, not some weak-kneed rarified old
god like a million other gods, pagans or whatnot, but Jehovah, some great
grandfather figure, some figure like he had seen one time in an art book of
Michelangelo paintings all flowing hair, beard, and robes dispensing justice to
the good, and thunder bolts to the wicked.
He thought that in those long ago days when this
valley was first settled and everybody was scared, scared of injuns, scared of
floods, scared that the food would not last, and scared that crops might not
come in that when they built that first piney cabin church and brought forth
their first preacher man that such a song would fortify them in their resolve.
He thought too about his parents right now probably over at Lord’s Word Baptist
a few blocks away singing this very song, his pious, frowning parents who were
forever warning him about the wages of sin, the lusts of liquor, woman and
gambling and on and on. And about their forbears on both sides who were among those
first settlers, those settlers who stayed while others moved west when the soil
ran out, and who built this town from slender pickings. Finally he wondered, seriously
wondered as much as his poor misbegotten head would allow, whether in those
olden times he would instead of being a half-heathen have lustily
sang the song that was now being sung to the high heavens. He thought yes, and
maybe would have led the damn thing.
Just
then he looked over at Daisy behind the preacher’s lectern, Daisy in high white
dress rapture as the song pushed on through another verse, and she looked over
at him, looked at him and his fierce blues eyes fixedly and she started to
blush, crimson red maidenly blush from what he could tell which even in that
humble plain board meeting house meant he had passed some test. Yah, she had
that something and he was going to find out about it come hell or high water
and stick to it until he found out what that something
was, stick it out just like those pioneers.
GUIDE ME, O THOU GREAT JEHOVAH
Guide Me, O Thou Great Redeemer
John Hughes (1873-1932)
| Words:
William Williams, Halleluiah (Bristol, England: 1745) (Arglwydd, arwain trwy’r anialwch). Translated from Welsh to English by
Peter Williams, Hymns on Various Subjects (Carmarthen, Wales: 1771); Williams published another English translation in
Lady Huntingdon’s Collection, circa 1772. Music: Cwm Rhondda, John Hughes, 1907 (MIDI, score). Hughes wrote this tune in Tonteg (near Pontypridd), Wales, to commemorate a music festival held in nearby Capel Rhondda, Hopkinstown. It was first performed November 1 that year to Welsh words by Ann Griffiths; in the early days it was simply known as Rhondda, but within a year he changed the name to Cwm Rhondda, used Peter Williams’ translation, and the rest is history Alternate tunes (some use slightly different endings to the lyrics):
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William Williams (1717-1791)
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If you have access to a picture of Peter Williams that we could put online, please click here.
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