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[ Home ] [ Article written when Harry was 68 ] [ Obituaries ] [ Recent articles in the Yeovil Press ]
[ Western Gazette ] [ Western Daily Press ]
Two recent
articles from the Western Daily Press:
GOLDEN GRATITUDE FROM FAMILY OF THE ANY OLD IRON MAN
07 April 2004
The family of
song-writing music hall genius Harry Wincott thanked the Western Daily Press yesterday for
helping to find his unmarked pauper's grave. The author of such famous songs as Any Old
Iron and Boiled Beef and Carrots would have been a very rich man if he had been writing
today.
But in his time many songwriters worked for a pittance and there were no performing rights
royalties.
Somehow he ended up in Yeovil, Somerset, where he died in 1947 with not even the money to
mark his grave in the town cemetery. Last week, pensioner Frank Leamon, of Martock, near
Yeovil, launched an appeal for a memorial.
Yesterday, Mr Wincott's greatgranddaughter Karen Gee, who lives in Christchurch, Dorset,
said the family now wanted to install their own headstone. She has been researching the
life history of her great-grandfather, but had not been able to establish where in Yeovil
cemetery he lies.
Now cemetery manager Manny Roper has identified the site for local historian Jack Sweet,
and today Mrs Gee and her father will visit the site.
Mrs Gee said yesterday: "We are very grateful for the research that has been done and
to the newspapers for highlighting my great-grandfather.
"I think we plan a simple family headstone which would make reference to his song
writing."
Mr Wincott was a Londoner who produced 2,000 songs - among them the World War I soldiers'
favourite Mademoiselle from Armentiers for his sons who were in the trenches.
PAUPER MUSIC LEGEND WILL GET A MEMORIAL
08 April 2004
The family of music hall
legend Harry Wincott visited his unmarked grave in a Somerset cemetery yesterday and vowed
to have a memorial put in place. They also appealed to anyone who knows more about Mr
Wincott's final days in the county to get in touch.
The Western Daily Press told last week how Martock pensioner Frank Leamon, 82, launched an
appeal for a memorial stone after he learned Mr Wincott, who wrote classic songs such as
Any Old Iron and Mademoiselle from Armentiers, was buried in a pauper's grave in Yeovil.
Mr Wincott, whose real name was Walden, was a Londoner who composed 2,000 songs, but was
working from late Victorian times to the 1920s when song-writers were not protected by
royalties and sold their work cheaply.
Publicity about Mr Leamon's appeal alerted the Wincott family, who knew he was buried in
Yeovil cemetery but not his exact spot.
Yesterday Mr Wincott's grandson Sid Walden, of Bournemouth, visited the grave with his
wife, Audrey, daughter Karen Gee, and grandchildren Jennifer, aged 10, and Andrew, 13.
Mr Walden, 77, met his grandfather only twice, the last time when he was just 13.
If anyone has any information they can contact the family at the website
www.harrywincott.co.uk.
[ Home ] [ Article written when Harry was 68 ] [ Obituaries ] [ Recent articles in the Yeovil Press ]
[ Western Gazette ] [ Western Daily Press ]
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