Hi Reinhard, Ray is talking about Tom Brown and his wife Bertha (I don't know which is the correct spelling of her maiden name I'm afraid!) . Here's some information about him: Tom Brown and details of The Smacksman here: The Smacksman. Ray is right about Frankie Armstrong adding Bertha's name to "The Doffing Mistress" . Tom was a very unassuming singer with an interesting repertoire of East Anglian songs -he did a lot of fundraising for the Caister lifeboat which apparently wasn't affiliated to the RNLI. I didn't know them very well, but I'm sure some other mudcatters will be able to contribute more details - I believe Tom and Barbara Brown knew them, and were sometimes confused with them! John