Clanna Morna - Bonnie Ship The Diamond

Filmed at the Baumann Centre on the unceded territories of the Songhees, Esquimalt and WSÁNEĆ nations (Victoria, BC in Canada).

Clanna Morna is:
Cody Baresich - Banjolin, Irish Bouzouki, Tin Whistle, Jangles, Vocals
Mark Leigh - Accordion, Tin Whistle, Vocals
Finn Letourneau - Fiddle, Vocals
Matt Pendlebury - Guitar, Vocals

Produced, Directed and Edited by Clanna Morna
Director of Photography/Gaffer/Camera Operator- Calum Sikander Smith
2nd Camera - Kathrin Heckel
Camera Assistant/Photographer - Megan Adair
Audio Mixing/Mastering - Circle A Studios


Trad. Scottish, circa 1825. One of the many sea shanties resulting from the whaling industry of West Greenland in the 1820s. Up to the middle 19th century, over-fishing in the Greenland Sea had had a devastating toll on the great right-whale populations, thus forcing the industrialists to continue their destructive practice elsewhere. The new hunting ground, the South-West Fishery, was moved to the Davis Straits. It was here that the The Diamond fished. In 1830, The Diamond, The Eliza Swan, The Resolution, The Rattler O Montrose, and seventeen other whaling vessels were caught in the ice of Melville Bay. The ships were lost and many sailors lost their lives.


Well the Diamond is a ship me lads
For the Davies straits we are bound
The quay it is all garnished with bonnie lassies 'round
Captain Thompson gives the order to sail the ocean wide
For the sun that never sets my lads
Nor darkness fills the sky.

And its cheer up me lads let your hearts never fail.
For the bonnie ship the Diamond goes a-hunting for the whale.

Along the quay at Peterhead the lassies stand around
Pullovers pulled about them and the salt-tears runnin’ down
Now don't you weep my bonnie wee lass though you be left behind
For the rose will grow on Greenland's ice before we change our minds.

Here's a health to the Resolution, likewise the Eliza Swan
Three cheers for the Rattler O Montrose
And the Diamond ship of fame
We wear the trousers of the white & the jackets of the blue
When we return to Peterhead, we'll have sweethearts anew

It will be bright both day and night
When the Greenland lads come hame
Our ship filled up with oil me lads and money to our name
We'll make the cradles for to rock ,And the blankets for to tear
And every lass in Peterhead sing “hush-a-bye, my dear.”