Richard Runciman Terry came from a seafaring family, the Runcimans, that were also great singers of shanties and sea songs. While, Terry had a very high opinion of Captain Whall and his book, the majority of songs contained in his books, The Shanty Book parts 1 & 2 and Salt Sea Ballads( all published between 1921 and 1931 by Curwen Press, were those Terry had personally learned or collected throughout his lifetime and mostly from Northumbrian sources and he went to great pains to give precise information regarding different versions of the same song and his opinions of the veracity of some versions that had gained popularity over the years.

Whall's book was limited to 28 shanties he had learned at sea, while the Shanty Books 1 & 2 contain 65 shanties and has been republished by Fireship Press under the title, The Way of the Ship: Sailors, Shanties and Shantymen.

Terry's book, Salt Sea Ballads has thirty songs divided into those that were generally sung or were specific to Northumberland, with 2 noted parody songs that had gained popularity with sailors. Unfortunately, the book is not easy to find and I grabbed the only one that I found online.

As for sanitizing the saltier songs, Terry admits to bowing to the need to omit lines or verses that would never have been accepted by the publishers... but he does give hints and tales of how his family handled his youthful inquiries regarding what he had overheard at the docks... it would seem that Rabelaisian was a favorite term in the Runciman family because it turns up in references by two of his uncles as well as his own books.

Terry had a high regard for what he termed scientific song collecting and what is now called ethnomusicology and had hoped to publish a more definitive book of shanties that would go into greater depth of just how the sailors used the shanties in their work and different versions that arose over time. That book was never published but I am convinced that he had at least a draft manuscript prepared, based on statements made in his books. The problem with Curwen Press was that they seemed to been more concerned with printing single pieces of sheet music to the public than full books... but their origin was as printers of church music and what came later were jobs that paid the bills.

When Mike first saw the copy of Way of the Ship he dismissed it as another sea shanty top 40... but when you consider that these were songs collected by the author over a long span of years (he was born 1864 and died 1938) and from first hand sources, it becomes obvious that his books are a valuable contribution to the effort of preserving maritime music for future generations.