My Old Water Can

by Phil Underwood

I've an old water can, it's painted so bold
I marvel, it's more than a hundred years old
It belonged to me father and me grandad before
It carried freah water through peace and through war

Chorus :
It was made long ago when Victoria was Queen
And often I think of the history it's seen
It's painted with roses, red, white and blue
My old water can, so bright and so true

With castles and roses, forget-me-nots too
The name of me boat in yellow and blue
With sprigs on the hinges, a shield on the spout
My old water can I'd not be without

Though its dented and worn with a rusty inside
My old water can still fills me with pride
And it sits up on top as along I do steer
And its filled with fond memories of the ones I've held dear

Here's a health to the boatmen and women before
Who plied the canals in peace and in war
And though working boats by road transport were killed
My old water can remembers them still

Award winning folk/roots musician Phil Underwood is a British singer/songwriter and playwright. Instead of being at the National Waterways Museum for the Easter Boat Gathering 2020, Phil and Denise (DryWood) performed a number of original songs celebrating the traditions and heritage of the English canals from their canal boat as a video recording which can be viewed in full here. The video above is a recording of just this one song.

As a canal boatman, Phil Underwood is passionate about the canal system, its history and the communities that live and work on it. He his head of the theatre company Bonnet and Belt which has produced a number of shows about the canals. Phil Underwood is a canal boatman, playwright, actor/musician, singer/songwriter and performer of traditional music. He is passionate about the canal, its history and the communities that live and work on it.