Henry Clay Work was another prodigious talent of the Civil War years, who went on to write many more songs, including Grandfather's Clock and The Ship that Never Returned, later re-written about a fellow named Charlie riding Boston's MTA. His father was an abolitionist, and although Henry wrote in Negro dialect for the minstrel stage, the feelings expressed here are sincere. I have not reproduced the dialect; but I have to admit I do find the piece a great deal of fun to sing. One bit of explanation: in verse 2, the master is getting tanned, and the Yankees might think he's "contraband." A contraband was an escaped slave. When the war first began, slaves almost immediately started appearing in Union encampments. The officers didn't know what to do with them and some even sent them back to slavery. But Benjamin Butler, who later became the loathed commander of Union-occupied New Orleans, decided to treat the slaves as Confederate property, as slave-owners had always claimed. If they are property, we are confiscating them as contraband of war and not sending them back. This policy continued throughout the war. Thanks to Keith Fletcher for the fiddle on this one.