> If anyone has suggestions for ballads to be covered outside the Child opus- let me know.

To those already suggested I would add The Three Butchers, Roud 17. I started a thread about that one some while ago.

See also Ballads not included in Child .

> I'm curious about Fowler's article SFLQ. He associates the ballad broadsides to a historical event, even naming the ship carpenter John Billson, who joined the Bedford (moored at Gosport) in that post on May 1, 1723, and remained there till his death on-board in September 1726.

> Fowler found a crewman named Charles Stewart who was aboard the vessel at the same time.

> Does anyone think that this ballad was based on these actual events?

I haven't read Fowler's article but I have read this discussion of it, which I do find convincing; even allowing for the way that tales can grow in the telling, and elements can migrate from one story or ballad to another.