One of the greatest gaps in our knowledge of the oral tradition is the lack of information we have from source singers themselves,
One the little we have gets undermined with accusations such as these we are left with nothing
It seems that the modern school of scholarship is based on destroying all other credible evidence to make room for their own pet theories and agendas
First time around Dave Harker failed miserably but it seems that his spectre has come back to haunt us
The technique appears to be to make unsubstantiated claims presented as facts and them move on. leaving them to hang

I don't bother too much with Wikipedia, but, having just looked up Walte Pardon there, I am appalled at the amount of misinformation has been put up there, even quotes by an old friend, Dave Hillary, are so off-beam as to be nonsensical
There seems to be an automatic assumption that, because singers from Walter's generation sang what they remembered, they regarded everything the same - they most certainly didn't - that's the approach adopted by today's revival - unfortunately
Jim Carroll