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about
Charlotte Janis and Jean-Etienne Baptiste du Breuil lived in the colony of New France, and the song is based on the documents that preserved their lives, including court cases and vital statistics records.
First Charlotte's father sues Jean in religious court, accusing him of "seduis", promising marriage in order to seduce a woman, then leaving her pregnant and unmarried. The court finds Jean guilty and orders him to pay a fine, but not before his father swears in open court that Charlotte is a prostitute, slandering her father's inn as a brothel. Charlotte's father, in order to defend his business' honor as well as his daughter's, takes Jean to the higher court of the King. The Conseil du Roi, of which Jean's father was an official, finds Jean guilty again, and spares him execution if he'll go through with the marriage.
Jean signs a betrothal, and the marriage contract lists Charlotte's dowry and possessions. Jean brings to the marriage only the clothes on his back and a set of bedlinens. His father, one of two notaries in the city, does not sign his marriage certificate.
Before the wedding, Charlotte gives birth to their daughter Anne Francois du Breuil, who is baptised in the local church. The priest notes her birth date in the parish record book, and over in the margin of the same page, her date of burial at eight days old.
Charlotte and Jean marry in October.
When Charlotte dies, her ghost supposes that her husband, having been disowned by his father and buried his child and wife, might sign up to be a sailor on a ship. The promise of the sea is death, one way or another, so Charlotte expects that sooner or later the sea will return her true love to her in the afterlife.
At the end of the song I let Charlotte speculate about the fate of the husband she left behind from beyond the grave, but in real life they'd had several children by the time Charlotte died in June of 1724 of the smallpox epidemic that had swept into town the previous autumn. The widowed Jean-Etienne married a second time, had more children, and then also lost his second wife. Five months after his third marriage, Jean-Etienne died leaving his 12 children with his new wife. None of Jean's three marriages were signed by his father, who remained one of the two notaries of the court.
Unbeknownst to the couple, one of their descendants would become the famous songwriter Melissa Etheridge, who would seek them in long-shelved archives on a television program. As she learned more of their story she said "I feel a song coming on.", and I paused the show and began to type out the lyrics as they came to me.
lyrics
Le Promis
Oh in the beaming height of summer
My love and I out walk
to see the sun shine on each other
away from eyes that gawk
We've been a courting since the winter
when frost bedecked the land
and after months of jest and banter
he's asked me for my hand
oh well, oh welladay
oh well, oh welladay
Oh shall we go to see the vicar
he's whispered in my ear
and by our troths, pledge to each other
our love and lives my dear
so have we made bright days in summer
our promise writ in blood
and were we not our fathers' children
our tale had been as good
oh well, oh welladay x2
My son shan't wed an inkeep's daughter
his father's face was still
Oh he shall take to wife one better
or live out of my will
so in the rustling days of autumn
my love has stayed away
and my old apron grew some shorter
our promise to betray
oh well, oh welladay x2
To bishop's court then went my father
My Jean there to accuse
he'd have him pay the damage done me
with crime of false seduce
Oh said ye not to my young Charlotte
ye'd take her hand to wife
but gone and left her without husband
and bringing forth of life?
oh well, oh welladay x2
Then testified my love's own father
he never made such vow
and never loved this low streetwalker
nor shall he pay her now
For this my father tasked the bailiff
arrest yon thieving knave
For stolen virtue of my daughter
the law his head will have
oh well, oh welladay x2
The counseil comes back with a verdict
My true love's life to spare
If he'd contract us to be wedded
Our worldy goods to share
So says the father of my lover
Go be an innkeep's son
Patron of yours I'll be no longer
To me you've died and gone
oh well, oh welladay x2
So comes anon my promised bridegroom
our contract writ and signed
With nothing but his clothes and bedding
his family left behind
we'll stay upstairs, until our wedding
within my father's inn
and pledge our promise in October
Our marriage to begin
Oh well, oh welladay x2
All in the greening spring of April
My time to bear will come
And forth I'll bring a living daughter
Called Anne Francoise her name
her baptism in the parish record
shows she is his and mine
and written in the nearest margin
inhumed in eight days time
oh well, oh welladay x2
Here I commit, with tears all flowing
my child into the ground
and I will have a new black ribbon
to bind my heart around
Oh child alas, that ye be perished
This misty sixth of May
no daughter to attend our marriage
Now in the grave ye lay
oh well, oh welladay x2
So stands my father at our wedding
to witness law be done
no child but had I yet a bridegroom
our marriage just begun
until the smallpox here since autumn
took me in May to bed
so never more we'll walk in summer
in June shall I lie dead
oh well, oh welladay x2
so goes anon my promised husband
no kin that live has he
without a wife or newborn daughter
he's buried her, then me
And has he still no home or father
whose will was writ in stone
And shall he seek to wed another
or will he live alone?
oh well, oh welladay x2
Oh in the beaming height of summer
my love his mark has made
upon a newly written contract
and there his life has laid
to sail away to lands uncharted
across the ocean vast
And if the sea should keep her promise
we'll be as one at last
oh well, oh welladay x2
And when the sea shall keep her promise
We'll be as one at last
oh well, oh welladay
oh well, oh welladay
credits
released March 12, 2022
Music and lyrics: M. Buzbee 2018
Voice and tenor ukulele: M. Buzbee
Ermagerd the Bard presents tunes and tales, silly songs and serious history, dead languages and live animal noises.
#staytuned for original songs about historic events and people, as well as early music in several languages and a few traditional pieces here and there. Ermagerd appears live at historical and fantastical festivals around the US....more
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