Swing Low, Sweet Chariot was created by Sarah Hannah Sheppard around 1847.
Sarah Hannah Sheppard, a slave in the south, sang this lullaby to her daughter Ella.
Around 1855, the woman who was Sarah’s slaveholder tricked 3 year old Ella into spying on Sarah. When Sarah found out, she was so distraught, that she decided to go down to the river to drown her daughter and herself. On the way, she came across an old slave women who told her not to do it. That God had need of the child. Touched by this, Sarah went back home with her daughter.
Ella went on to become one of the Fisk Jubilee Singers at Fisk University. One of the songs they sang was Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, which contributed greatly to the song’s popularity.
MP3 of Swing Low Sweet Chariot as performed by the Southern Four in 1924 and recorded by Thomas Edison.
Swing Low, Sweet Chariot
By Sarah Hannah SheppardSwing low, sweet chariot,
Coming for to carry me home
Swing low, sweet chariot,
Coming for to carry me home.Swing low, sweet chariot,
Coming for to carry me home
Swing low, sweet chariot,
Coming for to carry me home.I looked over Jordan, and I what did I see
Coming for to carry me home?
A band of angels coming after me
Coming for to carry me home.Swing low, sweet chariot,
Coming for to carry me home
Swing low, sweet chariot,
Coming for to carry me home.If you get there before I do
Coming for to carry me home
Tell all my friends I coming too
Coming for to carry me home.Swing low, sweet chariot,
Coming for to carry me home
Swing low, sweet chariot,
Coming for to carry me home.I’m sometimes up, I’m sometimes down
Coming for to carry me home
But still my soul feels heavenly bound
Coming for to carry me home.Swing low, sweet chariot,
Coming for to carry me home
Swing low, sweet chariot,
Coming for to carry me home.
Sheet Music for Swing Low, Sweet Chariot
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3 Responses to ““Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” with an MP3 Recording”
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March 27th, 2006 at 10:08 pm
How wonderful to read the history of this song! I sang this song to my son every night at bedtime, among one many, and he loved it. He used to ask me to sing “Wing Low”. It brings back such wonderful memories.
November 7th, 2006 at 11:02 pm
Thanks for posting this piece of history on the web and sharing it for free. I am from Georgia and have since left for North Carolina. Gerogia has such rich history rooted in slavery and the negro spirituals of the time near that area of plantations and surviving the heat.
Thanks Again,
Chris
February 8th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
I thank you so very much for the hisotry and the historically recorded version of this spiritiual. I downloaded it and took it with me to school. I teach 5th and 6th grade American History . I enjoyed telling the history and seeing the reactions of my students as they listenend to this older version of the song they know from Church and Sunday School. P.S. I am an older southern woman who grew up around this tradition.