ARI Smart Content - Data Table

Click to show on right, Sources for Song below
Bargery Number 015
Printer or Publisher Wolfe
Author Jim Ward (1910-1991)
Composer Jim Ward
Latest Date 1973
Evidence for Latest Date Publication date
Source of Text One Hundred Songs of Toil. British Library shelfmark X27/1624 DSC
Roud -
Parsed Title A-Working on the Railway
First Line On leaving school when I was a lad
Source of Music As text
Source Title A-Working on the Railway

A-Working on the Railway

 [015Notation]

On leaving school when I was a lad
To work at a trade the same as my dad,
It was the only job to be had. [Note 015.1]
A-working on the railway

Chorus: Toora-loora, toora-li-lay,
            Working long hours for very low pay.
            Toora-loora, toor-li-lay,
            A-working on the railway

My carman would harness the horse in his stall.
I couldn’t help him because I was small,
Then came the day I was doing it all
A-working on the railway.

I put on the collar and tighten the ains,
His pad and his back-strap, unravel the chains,
The bridle and bit, and fasten the reins
A-working on the railway

I sat at the back of a single-horsevan, 
That’s how my life on the railway began, [Note 015.2]
Guarding the goods and the load on the van
A-working on the railway.

From eighteen to twenty, down Billingsgate, [Note 015.3]
Unloading the fish, the plaice, cod and skate,
Getting my clothes in a terrible state,
A-working on the railway.

Now I’m a carman I’ll try to be kind
And smile at the boy who is sitting behind,
My very first day recalling to mind
A-working on the railway.

 

 

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bar578: Dates 1898~1898|

A poem complaining about the lack of delivery wagons at Bonnington, Leith

On the Old Ellenny

bar294: Dates ----~1973|

Autobiographical account by an employee of the London and North Eastern Railway.

Railway Belle

bar326: Dates ----~1865|

Travelling salesman falls for railway barmaid but loses out to railway guard.

A-Working on the Railway

bar015: Dates ----~1973|

A horse van driver recalls his working life.

Last Train From Bacup

bar213: Dates ----~----|

By Stanley Accrington

Bishopsgate Depot Fire

bar658: Dates 1950~----|

The fire of December 1964 by a worker employed in the yard

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