I can't recall who I first heard singing this, but enjoyed it enough to learn it and have been singing it on and off for thirty odd years. The words I used I think I took from Max Boyce's version, recorded on his "The Road and the Miles" album.

In that one, he dies in 1905, not 1902. Whether this alludes to the person or, as I suspect, five rhymes better with died, I don't really know.

I also bought a dancing plank doll at a festival and my children played with it for years.