Mary “Polly” Bird, née Scamp, 1900–1891
Polly Scamp was an older sister of Phoebe and Charlie Scamp. At least one of the songs in Phoebe’s repertoire – ‘Higher Germany’ – came from Polly.1
The identification of Polly with Mary Scamp comes from family historian Calum Mendham via the Findagrave website.2 She was born on 4th February 1900, and was probably the Polly Scamp registered in the Blean district in the first quarter of that year. But there is also a baptism record for a Mary Scamp which appears to relate to the same person. This is from Warehorne, dated 5th April 1900, and it gives her parents’ names as William and Ann Scamp. The official birth record for Polly gives the mother’s maiden name as Jones – and all of these details are consistent with what we know of Phoebe and Charlie’s parents.
I have not been able to locate the family of Bill and Ann Scamp in the 1911 census, either under the name of Scamp, or their alternative surname of Matthews. By June 1921 when the next census was taken Polly / Mary had married another traveller, Henry Bird, and they were to be found living in Fruitpickers’ Huts at Eynsford. Henry, born in Chatham, was 23 years old and employed as a Farm Labourer by M J Lee, Fruit Farmer. Mary, as she appeared here and in subsequent records, was shown as having been born in Margate. She was 22 years old3, and her occupation was given as “Farm Hawker”. They had a son, Henry, less than 1 year old.
At the time of the 1939 Register Mary was, unsurprisingly, to be found at the hop-picking – specifically at Frogs Hall Farm, Tenterden. She and Henry appear to have had two more children, a son and a daughter. Living alongside them were Sam, Henry and Edward Matthews. The latter two were almost certainly her brothers, Henry and Ted Matthews aka Scamp, while Sam was also most likely a relation, possibly one of her half-brothers.
Maud Karpeles must have encountered Polly during the course of her folk song collecting trip to Kent in October 1955:
I interviewed some gipsies, name of Stanley, at Bettenham. They know a number of songs, but I could not ask them to sing as there had just been a death in the family. I arranged to pay them a visit later on.4
Stanley was presumably a name of convenience used by Henry Bird’s family, in the same way as the Scamps would sometimes use the surname Matthews. In January the following year, Karpeles returned to Kent with Peter Kennedy, and her report makes clear that “Mrs Stanley” was Charlie Scamp’s sister:
Our main objective was Mrs Stanley (real name Mrs Bird), Bettenham, near Cranbrook, a gipsy whom I had met on my previous expedition. On our first visit she was out, but we called again on the morning of the 15th. As I suspected, she has a big repertory of songs. Unfortunately she was suffering from laryngitis. She managed to sing us a few songs, but she was unable to hold the tune and I doubt if this was entirely due to her ailment. She gave us the names of several members of her family, including her brothers, Charles Scamp at Chartham Hatch, near Canterbury, and Oliver Scamp, between Rochester and Sittingbourne, both of whom have a big repertory of songs which they learned from their parents. The Scamps are a big Romany clan scattered all over Kent and most of them seem well-to-do.5
Given the contextual information we have, this must have been Polly / Mary. Sadly no recording of the songs she sang appears to have survived, and we have no way of judging for ourselves if she was, as Karpeles implies, not a particularly skilled singer.
Peter Kennedy’s report on the same trip contains some additional information, and records the fact that Mrs Stanley not only directed the collectors towards Charlie and Oliver Scamp, but also towards Phoebe and Joe Smith in Suffolk:
Friday 15th January
To Mrs. Stanley (Bird) living in a caravan on Mrs. Stern’s farm, 3, Chimneys, Betenham, near Sissinghurst. She and her daughter Peg both had tonsilitis but we got names of large number of songs that she knew. Her life story would be well worth recording. She gave us address of her sister Mrs. Smith, Melton Meadows, Melton, Woodbridge, Suffolk. Her husband, Joe, plays fiddle and melodeon and names of other relations in Kent to whom we went the following day.6
Again, we can only regret that, while Mrs Stanley’s “life story would be well worth recording”, Kennedy never returned to record it.
The death of Mary Bird was registered in the Swale district in the first quarter of 1981. Her record on the Findagrave website states that she died in Faversham at the age of 81, on 11th March 1981, and was buried at All Saints Churchyard, Biddenden.
- Phoebe’s son Manny, quoted in the booklet to the CD The Yellow Handkerchief, Veteran VT136CD, 1998. ↩︎
- Mary “Polly” Scamp Bird, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/242450993/mary-bird ↩︎
- As of April 2026, the census record on the Findmypast website shows Mary as 32 years old, but checking a scan of the original document suggests that her given age was actually 22 years and 4 months; the transcription is in any case rather suspect – the family’s location is given as “Frumpockins Hunts” rather than “Fruitpickers’ Huts”! ↩︎
- Maud Karpeles, Folk Song Collecting Expedition Kent October 12th – 17th 1953, VWML Archive Catalogue MK/1/2/4907. ↩︎
- Maud Karpeles, Report on Collecting Expedition in Kent, January 14 – 17, 1954 (typescript copy held at the VWML) ↩︎
- Peter Kennedy, ‘Kent Trip January 1954’ (report submitted to Marie Slocombe, BBC), https://www.peterkennedyarchive.org/1954-2/kent-1954/ ↩︎
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