"Come Home, Father", a dirgesome song bemoaning the demon drink: too mawkish for modern tastes, but always sung at Temperance Meetings. An unhappy marriage seems to have affected his postwar output. Settling into sentimental balladry, Work had significant post-Civil War success with "The Lost Letter", and "The Ship That Never Returned"—a tune reused in the "Wreck of the Old 97" and "MTA". A massive hit was "My Grandfather's Clock", published in 1876, which was introduced by Sam Lucas in Hartford, Connecticut, and again secured more than a million sales of the sheet music, along with popularizing the phrase "grandfather clock" to describe a longcase clock." By 1880 Work was living in New York City, giving his occupation as a musician. He died in Hartford two years later at the age of 51. He was survived by his wife, Sarah Parker Work, and one of their four children. Henry Clay Work was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970. He was a distant cousin to Frances Work, a great-grandmother of Diana, Princess of Wales. Songs Among the best-known of Henry Clay Work's 75 compositions are: "Kingdom Coming" (c. 1863) "Come Home, Father" (1864) "Wake Nicodemus" (1864) "Marching Through Georgia" (1865) "The Ship That Never Returned" (1868) "Crossing the Grand Sierras" (1870) "My Grandfather's Clock" (1876) References External links The Music of Henry Work Henry Clay Work Find A Grave memorial Representative Poetry On-line - "Selected Poetry of Henry Clay Work" His page on HierarchyPedia 1832 births 1884 deaths American male composers American lyricists Songwriters from Connecticut People of the American Civil War Underground Railroad people 19th-century American composers Songwriters from New York (state) 19th-century American male musicians American male songwriters