My apologies that I have caused confusion with the attribution to Sir E. German - at the time that I wrote the notes for the song book I believed this to be the case - I probably got confused with 'Glorious Devon' for which German was certainly responsible. My copy of 'The Edwardian Song Book'. confirms that the 'other' Stonecracker John (copyrighted in 1909) has words by Fred E. Weatherly and Music by Eric Coates. First line is 'I sits by the roadside with great regularity' and this is the one that I have heard George Withers sing. When I wrote the song in the early 70s I was not aware that the title was not original - though the ideas in the songs are completely different.

I hope this clears things up.

Martin Graebe