Who Hung the Monkey? An Old Song from Hartlepool
The story of the Hartlepool monkey is one of those English folk curiosities that refuses to die. According to local legend, during the Napoleonic Wars a French ship was wrecked off the North East coast. Among the debris, a monkey in uniform washed ashore. Having never seen either a Frenchman or a monkey before, the townsfolk decided the unfortunate creature must be a French spy. A trial was hastily convened on the beach, and the monkey was hanged.
Whether or not the incident ever really happened is almost irrelevant. What matters is how the tale has lived on — in folklore, in civic identity, and in song.
The ballad
The most enduring version comes from Ned Corvan (1827–1865), a Liverpool-born, Newcastle-raised songwriter and music hall performer. Corvan specialised in satire, dialect, and comic observation, and Who Hung the Monkey? shows him at his sharpest.
The song was printed on a 19th-century song sheet and later reproduced in collections such as Roy Palmer’s Everyman’s Book of British Ballads (1980). Dave Harker also includes it in Cat-Gut Jim the Fiddler: Ned Corvan’s Life and Songs (2017). In Corvan’s hands, the monkey becomes “Pug”, and the tale is told with humour, cruelty, and bite.
A wider tradition
Interestingly, the Hartlepool story is not unique. A very similar tale circulates in Aberdeenshire, where a monkey met the same fate under almost identical circumstances. These stories may have been ways of mocking supposed provincial ignorance, or simply colourful anecdotes that grew legs (and tails) in the retelling.
Corvan’s version, though, is the one that stuck. Written in North East dialect, it lampoons Hartlepool while also skewering broader attitudes of suspicion and fear.
Legacy
The term “Monkey Hanger” is a well-known nickname for people from Hartlepool, a coastal town in County Durham. The expression originates from the Napoleonic-era legend of the hanged monkey and has since become a distinctive part of the town’s cultural identity.
What began as satire is now part of Hartlepool’s everyday life. The town football club’s mascot is a monkey called H’Angus, and locals often embrace the joke with pride. Through Corvan’s song, the tale entered popular culture, ensuring the “French spy” will never be forgotten.
Lyrics to Who Hung the Monkey?
Air: The Tinker’s Wedding
Written and sung by Mr E. Corvan, with immense applause at the Dock Hotel Music Hall, Southgate, Hartlepool
In former times when war and strife
From o’er the channel threatened life
When all was ready [for] the knife
To watch the Frenchmen funky-o
Chorus: Dooram, dooram dooram da etc.The fishermen with their courage high
Seized what they thought a real French spy
“Kill him”, says yan, “up him to die”
They did, and they hung the Monkey, O!
They tried every move to make him speak
They tortured Pug till he loud did squeak
“That’s French,” says one, “another, it’s Greek”
The fishermen then got drunky-O!
“He has hair all over,” the wives did cry
“Oh, what un woman with him would lie?”
With fish guts they bung’d up his eyes
Before they hung the Monkey, O!
Now some the monkey did bewail
For although dumb he had a tale (tail)
He’d sooner p’raps have gone to jail
For Pug was turning funky-O!
The monkey made some curious mugs
When they shaved his head and clipped his lugs
“Then it’s here ist way to serve humbugs”
Before they hung the Monkey, O!
“Hammer his ribs, the thundering thief
Pummel his peyte weel with your neef
He’s landed here for nought but grief
He’s Old Napoleon’s uncky-O!”
To poor Pug thus all hands behaved
“Cut off his jimmy,” some fools raved
Another cries out, “He’s never been shaved”
Before they hung the Monkey, O!
Then they put him on a grid-iron hot
The monkey then quite lively got
He grinned his teeth at all the lot
And rolled his eyes quite spunky-O!
Then a fisherman up to poor Pug goes
Saying, “Hang him at once to end his woes”
The monkey flew at him and bit off his nose
So it’s off to the Moor with the Monkey, O!
But let us hope that on the sea
We might maintain our Sovereignty
May France and England long agree
And never at each other get so funky-O!
As regards poor Pug, I’ve had my say
And former times have passed away
Still you may hear to this very day
Boys crying, “Who hung the Monkey, O!”
Notes on the text
Taken from a 19th-century song sheet (printer unidentified).
Reproduced in Dave Harker, Cat-Gut Jim the Fiddler: Ned Corvan’s Life and Songs (2017), available on Archive.org.
Also appears in Roy Palmer’s Everyman’s Book of British Ballads (1980).
My version
I’ve recorded my own take on Who Hung the Monkey?, which you can hear here:
