To further clarify, it is worth situating this song alongside "Van Dieman's Land" on the Rattle n' Hum album. It is now very evident that the principle memebers of U2 (Bono and Edge) had begun their rootsy/folk phases around the mid 1980s, and this song was clearly the first product of that phase. Specifically restoring Edge's family's links to South Wales (where he was born), in addressing the Miner's Strike of 1984 Bono employes historical metephor such as the 'hunter child': A speculative link here being the folk hero The Hunter (Lewsyn yr heliwr or 'Lewis the Huntsman'), a South Walian man deported to Van Dieman's Land during the industrial unrest in South Wales in the 19th Century.
To further clarify, it is worth situating this song alongside "Van Dieman's Land" on the Rattle n' Hum album. It is now very evident that the principle memebers of U2 (Bono and Edge) had begun their rootsy/folk phases around the mid 1980s, and this song was clearly the first product of that phase. Specifically restoring Edge's family's links to South Wales (where he was born), in addressing the Miner's Strike of 1984 Bono employes historical metephor such as the 'hunter child': A speculative link here being the folk hero The Hunter (Lewsyn yr heliwr or 'Lewis the Huntsman'), a South Walian man deported to Van Dieman's Land during the industrial unrest in South Wales in the 19th Century.