"Ben Bolt" (Roud 2653) is a sentimental ballad with lyrics derived from a poem by Thomas Dunn English. It enjoyed widespread popularity throughout the English-speaking world during the nineteenth century.

Thomas Dunn English wrote the poem "Ben Bolt" in 1842 at the specific request of Nathaniel Parker Willis. While he was then an active participant in the New York City literary scene and lived much of his life in New Jersey, English is popularly believed to have written the poem while visiting Tazewell, Virginia on a hunting trip, as claimed by regional folklorists.

The poem was published in the New-York Mirror, appearing in print for the first time on September 2, 1843.

The most popular musical arrangement of "Ben Bolt" was composed by Nelson Kneass in 1848. A widely reported story is that Kneass produced the song as accompaniment to a play about the recent Battle of Buena Vista, borrowing the music from a German melody. However, a search through Ludwig Erk's folk song compilation Deutscher Liederschatz produced no songs with similar melodies, and it is much more likely that the tune was an original composition by Kneass.

The poem, which is five stanzas long, describes nostalgic scenes from the life of the anonymous narrator. The narrator, who addresses each memory to the title character, begins the first stanza by describing the life and death of a woman named Alice.

Don't you remember sweet Alice, Ben Bolt,—
    Sweet Alice whose hair was so brown,
Who wept with delight when you gave her a smile,
    And trembled with fear at your frown?
In the old church-yard in the valley, Ben Bolt,
    In a corner obscure and alone,
They have fitted a slab of the granite so gray,
    And Alice lies under the stone.

Some variation occurs in the beginning of the poem's fourth stanza. In the original manuscript, the stanza begins as follows:

And don’t you remember the school, Ben Bolt,
    With the master so cruel and grim,
And the shaded nook in the running brook
    Where the children went to swim?