Cecil Sharp

Cecil James Sharp, 1859–1924

Cecil Sharp was the pre-eminent collector of English folk songs, noting down more than 3000 songs in England plus another 1500 in the United States. This was not only significantly more than any of his contemporaries, but also more than any subsequent collector. Unfortunately, however, despite the county’s proximity to his London home, he seems to have spent very little time in Kent.

The first collecting he carried out in the county was on 29^th July 1908, when he noted down six children’s singing games at the primary school in Trottiscliffe – Sharp recorded the location as Trosley, which was apparently the local pronunciation of the village’s name.

He returned to Kent in September of that year, collecting a dozen songs in Ruckinge, Ham Street and Warehorne on Tuesday 22^nd and Wednesday 23^rd September. This visit coincided with Sharp starting a new field notebook (CJS1/9/1/1908/7). The first page of that notebook contains a series of cryptic scrawled notes. My best attempt to decipher them is as follows:

Presumably these are men who had been recommended to Sharp as worth visiting in search of songs. Perhaps the County Members was recommended as a good place to meet singers. And were ‘Black Man’ and ‘Tom Tipples’ songs in the repertoire of Mr T. Major?

Census records identify a number of people called Maylam. For instance, Frank Maylam, a farmer and fruit grower, who lived at Home Farm, Ham Street; or John Maylam, a poultry dealer originally from Warehorne, who now lived at Lympne Corner.

“Higgins (84) Aldington” would almost certainly be Alfred Higgins, an agricultural labourer, born 1824, born in Bonnington, then living at Claphill, Aldington.

And thanks to David Boulding of the Boulding Study website, we can identify “Charlie Boulding (Cherry Picker)” as the Charles Boulding (1848-1929) who lived at Cherry Gardens, Bonnington – hence his nickname. His grandfather George Bolden (1781-1848) was the great-grandfather of Eyton Boulden from whom Francis Collinson collected a song in 1942 and, therefore, also to the Charles Boulding (1836-1926) who was regarded in the family as the source of that song.

As far as we know, Sharp didn’t actually meet any of the people named here – or if he did, he did not collect any songs from them.

Unless he stayed with an acquaintance, it seems likely that he would have taken lodgings at the Duke’s Head hotel, right in the centre of Hamstreet. He certainly met the landlord of the hotel, Clarke Lonkhurst, as he noted down a song  from him on Tuesday 22^nd September. The same day he collected one song from George Benstead, also at Hamstreet. The following day he took down two songs from Charles Barling at Ruckinge, and eight songs from James Beale, who was working at Warehorne at the time.

Sharp returned to Kent on 11^th October 1911. This must have been around the time of James Beale’s death – he was buried at Orlestone church less than a week later, on 17^th October. On this occasion he noted three carols from Mr Beale’s daughter, Alice Harden.

In 1908 Sharp appears to have written to the Governor of the home for retired merchant seamen run by the Royal Alfred Seafarers’ Society at Belvedere, near Erith, asking if there were any singers amongst the residents. The Governor’s reply was not encouraging, saying “I regret very much to say that I have no singing men in my crew. I have asked them times out of number to try but they have no voice left in them. Therefore it would only be waste of time and expense to you to come”. Sharp must have been persistent, however, as another letter from the Governor a week later began “You are at liberty to come to the Home and do the best you can”. If Sharp did visit the home in 1908, it would appear that the Governor was correct about not having anyone who could sing, as there’s no record of him collecting any songs at Belvedere at that time. However he subsequently collected thirteen sea shanties at the Royal Alfred from Bob Ellison, on the 4^th and 7^th September 1914.