These are two songs we recorded from Traveller Pop's Johnny Connors who was Vice Chairman of the National Gypsy Council in the late sixties; Johnny composed both of them.

They have been roughly annotated for a proposed selection of Travellers' songs we hope to publish from our collection sometime in the future. I have also included the titles of 20 songs by or specifically about Travellers which we hope will form one of the chapters.

Jim Carroll

GUM SHELLAC (Roud 2508) "Pop's" Johnny Connors; Tape 1 (2nd take). 2m 35.

We are the travelling people like the Picts or Beaker Folk,
The men in Whitehall thinks we're parasites but tinker is the word.
With our gum shellac alay ra lo, move us on you boyoes.

All the jobs in the world we have done,
From making Pharaoh's coffins to building Birmingham.
With our gum shellac ala lay sha la, wallop it out you heroes.

We have mended pots and kettles and buckets for Lord Cornwall,
But before we'd leave his house me lads, we would mind his woman and all.
With our gum shellac alay ra la, wallop it out me hero.

Well I have a little woman and a mother she is to be,
She gets her basket on her arm, and mooches the hills for me.
With our gum shellac alay ra la, wallop it out me hero.

[Dowdled verse.]

We fought the Romans, the Spanish and the Danes,
We fought against the dirty Black and Tans and knocked Cromwell to his knees.
With our gum shellac alay ra la, wallop it out me heroes.

Well, we're married these twenty years, nineteen children we have got.
Ah sure, one is hardly walking when there's another one in the cot.
Over our gum shellac alay ra lo, get out of that you boyoes.

We have made cannon guns in Hungary, bronze cannons in the years B.C.
We fought and died for Ireland to make sure that she was free.
With a gum shellac ala lay sha la, wallop it out me heroes.

We can sing a song or dance a reel no matter where we roam,
We have learned the Emperor Nero how to play the pipes way back in the days of Rome.
With our gum shellac ala lay sha la, whack it if you can me boyoes.

[Dowdled verse.]

"Pop's" Johnny Connors, the singer of this song, is also the composer. He was an activist in the movement for better conditions for Travellers in the 1960s and was a participant in the Brownhills eviction, about which he made the song, "THE BATTLE OF BROWNHILLS", which tells of an unofficial eviction in the Birmingham area which led to the death of two Traveller children. An account of part of his experiences on the road is to be found in Jeremy Sandford's book "Gypsies" under the heading, "Seven Weeks of Childhood". This was written while Johnny was serving a prison sentence in Winson Green Prison in the English Midlands. He said that further chapters of an intended biography were confiscated by the prison authorities and never returned to him on his release.

Gum shellac is a paste formed by chewing bread, a technique used by unscrupulous tinsmiths to supposedly repair leaks in pots and pans. When polished, it gives the appearance of a proper repair but, if the vessel is filled with water, the paste quickly disintegrates, giving the perpetrator of the trick just enough time to escape with his payment.

Ref.
Gypsies. Jeremy Sandford. Secker and Warburg 1973.

BATTLE OF BROWNHILLS (Roud 16716)
Rec. from "Pop's" Johnny Connors

Come all me loyal Travellers and listen to my song,
It's about th'oul brave Travellers they bravely made their stand
When the police and those Midland security scamps come to break our trailers down.

Sure it was in old Brownhills me boys, our brave Travellers made their stand,
Against those so-called gentlemen, they were more like Hitler's mob,
They attacked our camp one October Sunday morning all at the dawn of day,
What a terrible shock they got me lads, when they heard what I had to say.

Now Gratton Puxon** was there too, that great man from London Town,
They saw the anger all in his eyes, he did answer them one and all.
The students too, may God bless them, they did answer to my call,
And said, "Johnny, we will camp with you, and with yous we will fall."

Now the Connors's and th'ould Cash's, Murphys, Doran's, and Doherty' and Hanrahan's were there too,
And not forgetting Roy Parkinson**, and the bold brothers O'Donald.

In Walsall town one evening, the balance of the day
When squad-car loads of those licensed thugs came to tow our trailers away,
Three little sisters asleep in bed, asleep in bed they lay,
May our lord have mercy on their innocent souls; they died in that 'viction that day.

At the graveyard in Bilston we laid them in their grave,
Our hearts were filled with sorrow, our brave heads bowed with shame,
It is the wicked and cruel law of Walsall Town that we have to blame.

So we've heard of glorious St. Patrick, and all he did for our Irish race,
But I only wonder if he forgot to banish all the snakes.
We will pray to Chris or Columbus (Christopher Columbus?) sure he found Americay,
And please God all in their own good time:
(Spoken) Human minded people will find the travelling people a place to stay and education for their children".

The West Midlands of England have a reputation among Travellers as being inhospitable; a number of them have told us it is not a good place to travel. In 1964, during the making of the ground-breaking radio programme, "The Travelling People", it was a Birmingham Justice-of-the-Peace who suggested to producer Charles Parker that Travellers who refused to co-operate with local authorities should be "exterminated". This chilling, if not original statement was used to end the programme and can still be heard on the CD version.
Attitudes to Travellers illegally halting and the vexed question of site provision often verge on the ridiculous. In 1969 a local councillor at Brownhills, Birmingham announced that over one thousand loads of spoil (rubble) were to be brought into a site to prevent caravans being parked there. The £600 cost for this action was taken from the £1,000 contingency fund set aside to provide a permanent site.

In 1976 we visited a site in Birmingham on the eve of a mass exodus. The following day the occupants would all voluntarily leave but would be allowed to return several days later. This would enable the local council to claim that there was no permanent travelling population in the area, thus absolving them from meeting their legal obligation of providing basic facilities, toilets, running water or rubbish collection. The Travellers participated in this farce in order to be left in peace.

According to the singer, "Pop's" Johnny Connors, who made the song, the events described took place in November 1967 at Brownhills, Birmingham, when, during an eviction by police, council officials and private security employees, a trailer was being towed from the site, the owners having been arrested previously and held in custody. A solid fuel heater overturned and three young sisters asleep in the trailer were burned to death in the ensuing fire. The song was first sung at a ceremony to commemorate the Gypsy war dead in December 1967.

**Gratton Puxon Campaigner for Travellers rights; joint secretary of World Romani
Congress and co-author of The Destiny of Europe's Gypsies (Sussex Univ. Press 1972)

**Roy Parkinson Chairman of Midlands National Council for Civil Liberties.

Reference
The Travelling People (audio c.d.) Ewan MacColl, Peggy Seeger & Charles Parker.

Gypsy Politics and Social Change; Thomas Acton,

Songs By or About Travellers

Appleby Fair. (Roud 16699)
Battle of Brownhills (Roud 16716)
Big Dan Doran (Roud 16697)
Going To Clonakilty the Other Day. (Roud 16694)
Gum Shellack (Roud 2508)
I Had a Tidy Bit of a Fortune
The Jolly Tinker. (A) (Roud 863)
Jolly Tinker (B) Balls of Shangle Shee (Roud 863)
Jolly Tinker (C) Donnelly. (Roud 863)
Little Beggarman (Roud 900)
Marie from Gippursland
Paddy McInerney (Roud 3377)
Poor Old Man (A) (Roud 2509)
Poor Old Man (B) (Roud 2509)
Rambling Candyman (Roud 2163)
Stash All the Nackers
Terry Reilly's Ass and Car
Tom the **Gommer. (Roud 16713)
What Will We Do When We'll Have No Money. (Roud 16879)

Songs By or About Travellers

Appleby Fair. (Roud 16699)
Battle of Brownhills (Roud 16716)
Big Dan Doran (Roud 16697)
Going To Clonakilty the Other Day. (Roud 16694)
Gum Shellack (Roud 2508)
I Had a Tidy Bit of a Fortune
The Jolly Tinker. (A) (Roud 863)
Jolly Tinker (B) Balls of Shangle Shee (Roud 863)
Jolly Tinker (C) Donnelly. (Roud 863)
Little Beggarman (Roud 900)
Marie from Gippursland
Paddy McInerney (Roud 3377)
Poor Old Man (A) (Roud 2509)
Poor Old Man (B) (Roud 2509)
Rambling Candyman (Roud 2163)
Stash All the Nackers
Terry Reilly's Ass and Car
Tom the **Gommer. (Roud 16713)
What Will We Do When We'll Have No Money. (Roud 16879)