Songs with trains in them

[CNX]

An even older one......

Freight Train by Elizabeth Cotton.

I really am giving my age away with this one

'Frieght Train' was a hit in April 1957, then again in the form of a re-release in September of that year, but the artist was the 'Charles McDevitt Skiffle Group featuring Nancy Whiskey', so I'm not sure if its the same one as you referred to.

Perhaps the Elizabeth Cotton version didn't make the charts.

 

[Eagle]

A thought I had whilst listening to being subjected to the in-store music in Costcutter. A lot of songs refer to "midnight trains" but surely there's no such thing: all trains are scheduled to arrive/depart at either 2359 or 0001.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

'Frieght Train' was a hit in April 1957, then again in the form of a re-release in September of that year, but the artist was the 'Charles McDevitt Skiffle Group featuring Nancy Whiskey', so I'm not sure if its the same one as you referred to.

Perhaps the Elizabeth Cotton version didn't make the charts.

I now realise that in my posting, whilst mentioning Elizabeth Cotton, I omitted to say that she was the writer of the song and that there had been at least 50 versions of the song in both the USA and in Britain issued in the 1950's. The version that you had given in your posting reached number 5 in the UK sinlgle charts in 1957. But there had been many American recordings in the time of the American folk revival from 1951 onwards by such well known singers as Peggy Seegar.

The history of the song goes back 50 years prior to this as it was written by Elizabeth Cotton in 1902 and was inspired by the sounds of the freight trains she heard from her home in North Carolina. I don't think that they had "charts" in those days, but if they had, she would have been featured in these

 

[DJ737]

Hi there

By Tex Morton (1941)

The Luggage Van Ahead

On the midnight express as the train rattled on
All the passengers had gone to bed
All save one young man with a babe on his knee
Who sat there with a bowed down head

One commenced crying just then
as though it's poor heart would break
When an angry man said make that child stop it's noise
It's keeping us all a-wake
Put it out said another don't keep it in here
We've paid for our berths and want rest

But never a word said the man with the child
As he fondled it close to his chest
Oh where is it's mother go take it to her
A young woman softly then said.
I wish to god that I could, was the man's sad reply
But she's dead in the van a-head

While the train rolled onwards the husband sat in tears
Thinking of the happiness of just a few short years
Baby's face brings pictures of a cherished one who's dead
But baby's cries can't waken her
In the luggage van ahead


and a few others

Tex Morton
Recordings Regal Zonophone 78s:
On the Gundagai Line 1936
The Railway Bum 1937
Sergeant Small 1938 then banned as the notorious policeman took legal action - only a handful of discs were sold.
Travel By Train 1939 (also original song)
Freight Train Blues 1940
In The luggage Van Ahead 1941
Rodeo 78s:
Waiting for a Train 1949
Wabash Cannonball 1949
Railroad Boomer 1954

Buddy Williams

Recordings Regal Zonophone 78s:
Wingie The Railway Cop 1941

Smilin' Billy Blinkhorn

Recordings Regal Zonophone 78s:
Wreck of the Old 97. 1939 (Can't you take it back and get a boy?)

Slim Dusty

Recordings Regal Zonophone 78s
Train Whistle Blues 1963
Later recordings included
Last Train to Nowhere