Author: Andy Turner

Harry Baker

Harry Baker, 1876-1958

‘Death and the lady’, the only song in the Penguin Book of English Folk Songs that was collected in Kent, came from “Mr. Baker of Maidstone”. The song was included in the Journal of the English Folk Dance and Song Society Vol 5 No 1 (1946), with the following note from the collector Francis Collinson:

Mr. Baker of Maidstone, who is in his seventies, has worked all his life as an engineer at Thomas Tillings’. He is a little uncertain in his singing, and I had to ask him to repeat the tune of “Death and the Lady” a number of times before I was certain of having it down correctly.

It only became apparent in the 1990s, when Collinson’s English song MSS became more readily accessible, that he had in fact collected songs from both Mr and Mrs Baker.

Harry Baker was born on 12th December 1876 and baptised 14th January 1877 at St Lawrence, Mereworth. His father William was a labourer, originally from East Malling, his mother was Eliza née Honey, from Mereworth. In 1881 the family was living at New Pound, Mereworth; Harry was the second youngest of the four children in the family home. By 1891 they had moved a couple of miles away, to Dukes Place, West Peckham. Harry, now 14, was described as “Houseboy domestic”. 10 years later they were to be found at Court Lodge, East Peckham; Harry’s occupation was given as Grocer’s assistant.

Shortly before Christmas 1903, on 19th December, Harry married Frances Harriett Bell, at St Lawrence, Mereworth. His occupation at the time was given as “Labourer”. By the time of the next census, in 1911, Harry was working as an Assurance agent for the Prudential and living at 108 Upper Fant Road, Maidstone, with Frances, and a 5 year old daughter, Hilda. They were at the same address in 1921, and the family now included a son, Harry, who had been born in 1912. Harry’s occupation was shown as “Hardener (Steel)”, but in the Employer column it states “Out Of Work”.

The 1939 Register shows that they had moved at some point literally just round the corner, to 5 Evelyn Road, Maidstone. As well as Frances, his daughter Hilda – now Hilda Stanley – was also living in the house. Harry was working as “Steel Hardener Heavy Worker”. His employer is not given, but presumably this was Thomas Tilling Ltd. – or, to be accurate, Tilling-Stevens, whose factory was less than a mile away in St Peter’s Street. That factory was designed by Wallis, Gilbert and Partners, the foremost factory architects of the inter-war period. It is now a Grade II listed building, “one of few surviving examples of a group of English factories built using the Kahn Daylight System, an adaptable, efficient and influential system of factory building, developed in America for the construction of automotive factories”[1]. To quote further from the same Historic England record:

Tilling-Stevens Ltd was formed in 1915 after WA Stevens, inventor of the petrol-electric motor, met Richard Tilling of Thomas Tilling Ltd, London’s oldest omnibus operator (established 1847). The men recognised the potential for petrol-electric transmission in motorised buses, and the companies went into partnership together, manufacturing their own vehicles. New premises were added to Stevens’ Maidstone works (known as the Victoria Works) in 1912, and following the formation of Tilling-Stevens Limited the works were enlarged again with the construction of the Wallis Gilbert and Partners factory in 1917 to accommodate production for war requirements.

The company manufactured buses and other commercial vehicles; during the Second World War their work would have been turned over to the war effort, and they produced searchlight lorries for the Army.

Harry Baker died in the second quarter of 1958.

Songs

Bold Fisherman (Roud 291)

Death and the Lady (Roud 1031)

[1] Historic England, Official list entry for Former Tilling-Stevens Factory, St Peter’s Street, Maidstone, Kent, ME16 0ST, https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1408072

0

Charles Barling

Charles Barling, 1828-1917

Cecil Sharp noted down two songs from Charles Barling, then 81 years old, at Ruckinge, on the 23rd September 1908. Mr Barling had been baptised on 20th January 1828 at St Mary Magdalene, Ruckinge. His parents were William, listed as “Labourer”, and Mary Ann, née Clemens, originally from Stanford, on Stone Street. They had married the previous April, at the church of St Peter & St Paul, Newchurch.

By the time of the 1841 census Charles, just 10 years old, was already out at work, as a servant for William Chittenden, landlord of the Blue Anchor at Ruckinge. Ten years later, he was living in the family home at Gorse Green Farm, Ruckinge. Charles, his father, and his brothers James and William (i.e. all of the male members of the household) are listed as agricultural labourers.

He was married in November 1851 to Lydia Knowlden, of Ivychurch. They had 10 children, and lived the rest of their lives at a variety of addresses in Ruckinge. When Sharp encountered him, Charles, Lydia and two of their children, Percy and Lily, were living at The Corner, right in the centre of the village, close to the Blue Anchor. The 1901 census gives Charles’ occupation as “Ordinary labourer”, but also notes that he was “Nearly Blind”.

Charles lived to be 89. He was buried in the same church where he’d been baptised, on 22nd January 1917.

Harry Barling, from whom Francis Collinson collected a couple of songs in the 1940s, was Charles Barling’s cousin: Harry’s father Frank was a younger brother of Charles’ father William.

Songs

0

Where the lambs they skip with pleasure

From Eyton Boulden

Collected by Francis Collinson, Bonnington, 17th June 1942.

Francis Collinson Manuscript Collection COL/2/16, COL/2/15B

Roud 18820

COL_2_16 Where de lambs dey skip wid pleasureDownload

The neatly written out copy in Francis Collinson’s collection does not appear to be in Collinson’s handwriting, and was quite possibly written out by Eyton Boulding in preparation for the recording of the BBC radio programme Country Magazine which was broadcast on 28th June 1942. It is headed “Chas Boulding’s song” – referring to Eyton’s “Uncle Cholly”, Charles Boulding.

It is unclear why, in that copy, the song is titled ‘Where de Lambs Dey Skip Wid Pleasure’. This kind of substitution of ‘d’ for ‘th’ was often associated with blackface minstrelsy. But in this case it seems more likely that it is an attempt to reproduce the old Kentish dialect, where the same substitution of letters took place – see A dictionary of the Kentish dialect and provincialisms in use in the County of Kent (1888) page vi.

COL-2-15B At the Foot of Yonder MountainDownload

No singer or location is given for this song in the VWML archive catalogue. However the sheet in Collinson’s MS is headed “Pinn Farm, Bonnington, Nr. Ashford”, which was the residence of Eyton Boulding. And it is dated 17th June 1942, which is the same date given in the catalogue for ‘Where de Lambs Dey Skip Wid Pleasure’ (COL/2/16).

A version of the song was included in the Kent-themed episode 5 of BBC Home Service programme Country Magazine, broadcast at 13:15 on Sunday 28th June 1942. The song was sung by baritone Frederick Woodhouse, with music arranged by Francis Collinson, who may have been responsible for the rewritten words.

  1. At the foot of yonder mountain where the river runs so clear
    I have orchards, fair green meadows, and good hops for Kentish beer
    There’s fine arching, fine poaching and there’s music everywhere
    At the foot of yonder mountain, where the river runs so clear.
  2. If little Mary had been constant then she might have been my bride.
    But her mind it was more fickle than the rain upon the tide,
    So I took me another for to wed and give me cheer,
    At the foot of yonder mountain, where the river runs so clear.
  3. As I walk about my meadows, as I labour in my fields,
    When I view the bounteous increase that our toil and patience yields,
    I do know I’ve been faithful to the land I hold so dear
    At the foot of yonder mountain. where the river runs so clear.

(Source: Maidstone Telegraph, 24th July 1942)

0

Francis Jekyll

Francis Jekyll, 1882-1965

Known to family and friends as ‘Timmy’, Francis Jekyll (pronounced “Jee-call”) was the nephew of Gertrude Jekyll, the garden designer. After attending Eton and Oxford, in 1906 he took a job at the British Museum as Assistant in the Printed Books Department, working in the Printed Music Section. Between 1905 and 1911 he collected folk songs in Sussex, Herefordshire, Kent and Norfolk, and a number of Irish dance tunes from a fiddle-player at Kilmarnock in Scotland. The material he collected appears in the collections of Ella Leather, Lucy Broadwood, and his close friend George Butterworth – all available to view via the VWML Archive Catalogue.

He noted two songs from a Mrs Powell at Minster in Sheppey, in August 1910. She appears to have been a resident of the Sheppey Workhouse, where George Butterworth collected a further 3 songs in September of the same year.

Jekyll resigned his post at the British Museum in 1914. In a letter to Lewis Jones dated 3rd June 1999, Francis Jekyll’s great niece Mrs. Primrose Arnander wrote:

I am sure that there was an initial nervous breakdown which must have led to recurring clinical depression, an illness well understood, accepted and treated nowadays but little understood then…

In 1932 Gertrude Jekylll died and left Munstead Wood [her home in Surrey] and its contents to her sister-in-law, Agnes Jekyll, Francis Jekyll’s mother. In 1937 Agnes Jekyll died and Munstead Wood passed in toto to Francis Jekyll. He did not live there for very long, but tried to keep her nursery garden going and was still fulfilling orders up to the war time. Around 1939 Francis Jekyll moved into the Hut, a smaller house in the grounds, and Munstead Wood was let and finally sold. There was a sale of all the contents in 1948; this included books and chattels from Munstead House that had been left to Francis and also, in that sale, he must have sold all his music and books for the contents of the sale included books, scores and periodicals which showed an interest in music that would have been far beyond Gertrude Jekyll. Timmy lived on in the Hut with a housekeeper until his death in 1965. He was a sad and rather lonely figure at the end and was never really able to shake free of his debilitating depression. He attended concerts and festivals of music, but never returned to an active role in the field.1

He died in 1965, aged 82

  1. quoted in Lewis Jones, Francis Jekyll (1882-1965) Forgotten Hero of the First Folk Song Revival, English Dance and Song, June 2000 ↩︎

0

Proudly powered by WordPress | Theme: Baskerville 2 by Anders Noren.

Up ↑