# There Was a Crooked Man
**There Was a Crooked Man** is an English nursery rhyme in which a crooked man walks a crooked mile, finds a crooked sixpence on a crooked stile, buys a crooked cat that catches a crooked mouse, and lives with them all in a little crooked house. It was first recorded in print by the antiquarian James Orchard Halliwell in *The Nursery Rhymes of England* (London, 1842), a collection he described as gathered "principally from oral tradition"[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man). The rhyme is cataloged as Roud #4826 in the English folk-song index[2](https://balladindex.org/Ballads/BGMG224.html).
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| First print record | James Orchard Halliwell, *The Nursery Rhymes of England*, London, 1842[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man) |
| Age | Certainly older than 1842, since Halliwell wrote down verses already spoken aloud; how much older is unknown, and no earlier printed trace exists[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man) |
| Halliwell's wording | The man "went a crooked mile" and found his sixpence "against a crooked stile"[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man) |
| Folk index | Roud #4826; keywords "home animal"; found in the United States (Midwest) and Ireland[2](https://balladindex.org/Ballads/BGMG224.html) |
| Best-known origin theory | The crooked man as the Covenanter general Sir Alexander Leslie; first traced to Katherine Elwes Thomas, *The Real Personages of Mother Goose* (1930), who produced no evidence for it[2](https://balladindex.org/Ballads/BGMG224.html) |
| Modern horror use | A malevolent extended version of the rhyme was invented for *The Conjuring 2* (2016)[3](https://theghostinmymachine.com/2021/08/11/encyclopaedia-of-the-impossible-the-crooked-man/) |
## Text and form
The version most people sing today runs:
> There was a crooked man,
> And he walked a crooked mile.
> He found a crooked sixpence
> Upon a crooked stile.
> He bought a crooked cat,
> Which caught a crooked mouse,
> And they all lived together
> In a little crooked house.[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man)
Halliwell's 1842 wording differs slightly: the man "went a crooked mile" and found his sixpence "against a crooked stile"[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man). The 1851 chapbook *The Crooked Man and Other Rhymes*, in the Aunt Mary's Little Series, prints the same opening, "There was a crooked man, and he went a crooked mile", though its second stanza line reads "He bought a crooked hat, which caught a crooked mouse"[4](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Crooked_Man_And_Other_Rhymes).
As verse, the rhyme is built on repetition: every noun in the story is qualified by "crooked", and the lines follow an AABB rhyme scheme with lines of twelve to thirteen syllables, a pattern that aids memorability[5](https://poemanalysis.com/mother-goose/there-was-a-crooked-man/). It belongs to the tradition of nonsense verse and cumulative nursery rhymes[6](https://knotmagick101.wordpress.com/tag/crooked-path/).
## Print history
Halliwell recorded the rhyme with no political note at all[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man). Because he was writing down verses already circulating by word of mouth, the rhyme is certainly older than 1842, but there is no earlier printed trace of it[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man). It appeared in Victorian children's books through the second half of the century, including *The Crooked Man and Other Rhymes* (1851), and became widely popular in the early twentieth century, when illustrators took up the chance to draw tilted houses, leaning stiles, and lopsided cats[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man). A printed example of that later era is its appearance in *Princess Marie-José's Children's Book* (1916)[6](https://knotmagick101.wordpress.com/tag/crooked-path/).
## Origin theories
Several explanations of the rhyme's imagery circulate, and none can be traced back to the rhyme's own era, so all are best treated as theories rather than history[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man).
**The Scottish theory.** A popular tale identifies the crooked man as Sir Alexander Leslie, the Covenanter general who battled for Scottish religious and political liberty under Charles I; the "crooked stile" thus stands for the English–Scottish border, and the "little crooked house" for the uneasy union of two kingdoms under a single monarch[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man). In some versions of the rhyme, the crooked sixpence stands for Charles I, who would employ the [Covenanters](https://www.edgepedia.org/covenanters) so long as they helped him keep his throne yet had no genuine interest in them.[2](https://balladindex.org/Ballads/BGMG224.html) A related local version, attributed to the Dunse History Society, ties the rhyme to the bloodless Battle of Duns of 1639, where Leslie, then 57, ordered defenses built on Duns Law; contrary to the cat catching the mouse, no true battle took place because neither side wanted to fight[7](https://whiteadder.aocarchaeology.com/stories-and-ballads/battles-and-heroes/there-was-a-crooked-man/).
The attribution has a traceable starting point: the folk-song index notes that the suggestion appears to go back to Katherine Elwes Thomas, *The Real Personages of Mother Goose* (1930), and records that Thomas never produced evidence for any of her identifications, most of which are judged extremely improbable[2](https://balladindex.org/Ballads/BGMG224.html). The reading is a modern interpretation, unsupported by any seventeenth-century evidence[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man).
**The Lavenham theory.** A different claim singles out Lavenham, a wool town in Suffolk, where the medieval timber-framed buildings have, over the centuries, developed well-known leans and tilts as they settled; among the town's structures is one called The Crooked House. The origin is appealing but again offered without documentary support[1](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man).
Nothing survives to identify who first wrote it, no explanation of its meaning was recorded at the time, and there is no sign it was meant to carry a hidden message; collectors of the era saw it as nothing more than a children's rhyme[6](https://knotmagick101.wordpress.com/tag/crooked-path/).
## Later adaptations
The rhyme has generated a family of darker descendants. An extended, malevolent version, in which the crooked man rings a crooked bell, murders his crooked family, and laughs a crooked laugh as his soul spirals into a crooked Hell, has a definite source: it is an invention of [The Conjuring](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-conjuring) film universe, spoken by the shape-shifting, bowler hat-wearing entity in *The Conjuring 2* (2016)[3](https://theghostinmymachine.com/2021/08/11/encyclopaedia-of-the-impossible-the-crooked-man/). A warning sometimes attached to these versions, that reciters and those living with them may be targeted, belongs to the same invented tradition[3](https://theghostinmymachine.com/2021/08/11/encyclopaedia-of-the-impossible-the-crooked-man/).
Video games have used the figure as well: *The Crooked Man* (2012, remastered 2018) by the independent developer Uri, and *The Wolf Among Us* (2013–2014) by [Telltale Games](https://www.edgepedia.org/telltale-games), itself adapted from the *Fables* comic series[3](https://theghostinmymachine.com/2021/08/11/encyclopaedia-of-the-impossible-the-crooked-man/). The rhyme also remains in ordinary circulation as a children's verse, recorded in folk collections from the American Midwest and Ireland[2](https://balladindex.org/Ballads/BGMG224.html) and still used in early-reading materials[8](https://www.raz-plus.com/book.php?id=585).
## References
1. [There Was a Crooked Man – words, origin, meaning and activities, Learn a Rhyme](https://www.learnarhyme.com/nursery-rhymes/there-was-a-crooked-man)
2. [There Was a Crooked Man, Traditional Ballad Index (BGMG 224)](https://balladindex.org/Ballads/BGMG224.html)
3. [The Crooked Man: Encyclopaedia of the Impossible, The Ghost in My Machine (2021)](https://theghostinmymachine.com/2021/08/11/encyclopaedia-of-the-impossible-the-crooked-man/)
4. [The Crooked Man and Other Rhymes, Aunt Mary's Little Series (1851), Wikisource](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Crooked_Man_And_Other_Rhymes)
5. [There Was a Crooked Man by Mother Goose, Poem Analysis](https://poemanalysis.com/mother-goose/there-was-a-crooked-man/)
6. [Crooked path, Knot Magick](https://knotmagick101.wordpress.com/tag/crooked-path/)
7. [There was a crooked man, Whiteadder (AOC Archaeology)](https://whiteadder.aocarchaeology.com/stories-and-ballads/battles-and-heroes/there-was-a-crooked-man/)
8. [There Was a Crooked Man, Raz-Plus](https://www.raz-plus.com/book.php?id=585)
---
*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Music › Musical works and recordings › Compositions and songs › Children's, novelty, parody, and traditional children's songs › Nursery rhymes and traditional children's songs*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license