One of the more memorable songs in Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton is arguably “Yorktown,” in which Alexander and his friends finally defeat their British nemesis. A particularly eerie moment in the song is when the “British” sing “The World Turned Upside Down.” It goes something like this:
We negotiate the terms of surrender
I see George Washington smile
We escort their men out of Yorktown
They stagger home single file
Tens of thousands of people flood the streets
There are screams and church bells ringing
And as our fallen foes retreat
I hear the drinking song they’re singing
The world turned upside down
The world turned upside down
The world turned upside down
The world turned upside down
Down, down, down, down
“The World Turned Upside Down,” for those who may be unacquainted with its real-life historic background, is supposedly the song the British played during their formal surrender to George Washington’s colonials and their French allies following the Battle of Yorktown. But did the British really play such an aptly-named song? Probably not.
The first mention of “The World Turned Upside Down” (or TWTUD) didn’t appear until nearly fifty years after Yorktown. That’s despite the fact that a large number of newspapers covered the battle and dozens of witnesses from the battle and its aftermath had their observations recorded. Even then, the claim has a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend vibe and the supposed witness had other recollection and reliability issues.
In debunking this popular myth, scholars and mainstream American history sources then turn to claim that in fact there was no British song called “The World Turned Upside Down” for British instrumentalists to play. For example, from Mount Vernon:
Nearly one hundred years of professional cataloging of early Anglo-American music hasn’t turned up a single eighteenth-century British tune or march called WTUD. (Writers who say there were several English WTUD tunes in the eighteenth-century are guessing from bad extrapolations).
That is going a step too far. There absolutely was a song entitled “The World Turned Upside Down,” published as early as 1646/1647. It was a protest song against Puritan England’s ban on Christmas celebrations (under Oliver Cromwell but not solely his doing, as has often been portrayed). The Cromwell Museum even provides the title page of the publication:
Because the Christmas ban was unpopular, the ballad attacking the ban was popular. We have contemporary publication records in the form of the Thomason Tracts.
Anyway, the lyrics of the song naturally have absolutely nothing to do with Yorktown or any relevant themes either way. The lyrics are, again naturally, very focused on Christmas:
Listen to me and you shall hear, news hath not been this thousand year:
Since Herod, Caesar, and many more, you never heard the like before.
Holy-dayes are despis’d, new fashions are devis’d.
Old Christmas is kickt out of Town.
Yet let’s be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn’d upside down.
The wise men did rejoyce to see our Savior Christs Nativity:
The Angels did good tidings bring, the Sheepheards did rejoyce and sing.
Let all honest men, take example by them.
Why should we from good Laws be bound?
Yet let’s be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn’d upside down.
Command is given, we must obey, and quite forget old Christmas day:
Kill a thousand men, or a Town regain, we will give thanks and praise amain.
The wine pot shall clinke, we will feast and drinke.
And then strange motions will abound.
Yet let’s be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn’d upside down.
Our Lords and Knights, and Gentry too, doe mean old fashions to forgoe:
They set a porter at the gate, that none must enter in thereat.
They count it a sin, when poor people come in.
Hospitality it selfe is drown’d.
Yet let’s be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn’d upside down.
The serving men doe sit and whine, and thinke it long ere dinner time:
The Butler’s still out of the way, or else my Lady keeps the key,
The poor old cook, in the larder doth look,
Where is no goodnesse to be found,
Yet let’s be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn’d upside down.
To conclude, I’le tell you news that’s right, Christmas was kil’d at Naseby fight:
Charity was slain at that same time, Jack Tell troth too, a friend of mine,
Likewise then did die, rost beef and shred pie,
Pig, Goose and Capon no quarter found.
Yet let’s be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn’d upside down.
I’m sure you’ll now add it to your Christmastime playlist.