Going back exactly 10 years minus 1 day to Sandy Paton's post: what he is remembering is the song that Seamus Ennis used always to sing at the end of an evening when whoever was MC-ing would call on the residents to round off with the shortest song they knew. Ewan MacColl would always come up with a pathetic little song that ended "Poor little innocent child", tho I recall no more about it. Then Seamus would sing, to tune of The Irish Washerwoman, some variant of the one Sandy quotes ~ not always with identical names or words, but always same plot. Version I have carried with me the last 52 years (it was 1958 when Sandy was in London) went

O'Dwyer is dead and Maguire don't know it
Maguire is dead and O'Dwyer don't know it
Maguire and O'Dwyer are lying in one bed
And neither one knows that the other one's dead

~Michael~