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Information collected from Wikipedia.
Harry Barling,
singer from South Willesborough, Ashford, Kent, 1867 - 1947.
He was living at 110 Gladstone Road, South Willesborough when Francis
Collinson collected songs from him on 3rd December 1942:
King Arthur
The Thresherman
1. It’s of a noble gentleman who lived down in Kent
Close by where lived a thresher whose family was great
Whose family was great though most of them were small
And he’d nothing but hard labour to maintain them all
2. At times when he comes home from work as tired as could be
He takes his youngest child and dances on his knee
While others they come round with their sweet flattering toys
And that’s the very comfort that a poor man enjoys
3. The noble gentleman he met the thresherman one day
And boldly stepped up to him and these words then did say
You have in all large family, we know it to be true
And how is it you maintain they so well as you do?
4. Well I can reap and mow, and it’s I can plough and sow
And sometimes it’s hedging and to ditching I do go
There’s nothing comes amiss to me, the harrow or the plough
And so I do maintain them by the sweat of my brow
5. My wife she is willing to join in the yoke
We live just like two turtle doves, each other don’t provoke
The times are very hard and we are very poor
And can scarce keep the wolf and bear from the door
6. Well done, you noble thresherman, you speak well of your wife
I will make you live happy all the rest of your life
There forty-five good acres of land I’ll give to thee
To maintain you and your wife and your sweet family
7. God bless that nobleman, he’s dead and he is gone
I hope his soul’s in heaven to gain the better end
The best one gone before us, and we’re left here to mend
So we must follow after them as well as we can
He had worked as a master carpenter, and was a member of the
Aldington Brass Band for 45 years - he was bandmaster when he retired
from the band in 1930. A keen cyclist, he died at the age of 80 when,
cycling to visit his sons in nearby villages, he was in a collison with
a motor-cyclist (Obituary in Kentish Express, Friday 19th September
1947).
Most likely the same Harry Barling who is listed in the 1901 Census
as a Carrier General, living at Aldington, born at Ruckinge; and in the
1881 Census as living at the "Good Intent", Aldington Frith - son of
Frank Barling (born 1819), Innkeeper and Carrier.
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