Maybe it would be helpful to post Malcom's message on this song (from the "missing tunes" thread)

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Thread #48931   Message #745174
Posted By: Malcolm Douglas
09-Jul-02 - 12:43 PM
Thread Name: Tune Add: Missing DT tunes - Part NINE
Subject: RE: Tune Add: Missing DT tunes - Part NINE

2617)   OLD MINER  The DT text was apparently copied from a now-defunct website containing lyrics of songs recorded by Maddy Prior. It appears to have been transcribed by ear from a record, and is inaccurate and incomplete. The song was published in Roy Palmer's Songs of the Midlands (1972); it was collected by John Moreton in the early 1960s, from an unnamed source. Palmer notes:

"Sung by an old miner in Haunchwood Pit, Nuneaton, Warwickshire... The pit is now closed. The informant originated in Durham, where he had learned the tune. The words were his own."

This being the case, the DT text should be amended to reflect the writer's intention rather than the transcriber's (apparently, rather poor) ear or Maddy Prior's memory. In fact, a nearly correct text was posted at Maddy Prior's Lyrics: The Old Miner a couple of weeks after the mutilated set; the poster innocently added it as "another version" rather than (almost) the right version (which is what it is; this is not a traditional song) and the harvesters passed it over. Some small amendments to it:

Verse 3, line 3: that train
Verse 4, line 1: Oh who will load
Verse 5, line 2: When friends are dying
Verse 6, line 3: this old coal miner
Verse 6, line 4: paid God my fare.

In the final lines of verses 2,3,4 and 5, it is Who, dear God; not Oh, dear God.

The unnamed singer appears from the notation given to have sung an extra phrase at the end of each verse; this is not made clear in the text given in the book, however, and it looks as if a lot of revival singers have simply omitted it. To quote the first verse as an example:

Oh, who'll replace this old miner,
And who will take my place below ?
And who will follow the trepanner,
Oh, dear God, when I go?
Who, dear Lord, who?

This final line is presumably to be added to each verse. Midi made from notation in the work cited, including the "missing" line.