1845 story: wedding procession

“…A short time before this took place, a procession moved from the yeoman’s cottage, in the direction of the church
,… Then came a company of morris-dancers on foot, jingling it very prettily, with a most moving accompaniment
of pipe and tabor….”

The Rover, a Dollar Weekly Magazine 1845-06-28: Vol 5 Iss 15

1846 newspaper report “The Whitsuntide Festivities”Cheltenham Journal and Gloucestershire Fashionable Weekly Gazette. - Monday 08 June 1846

1847
“ a very few years before, he witnessed "a numerous retinue of morris-dancers, remarkably well habited,
skilfully performing their evolutions to the tune of a tabor and pipe, in the streets of Oxford University ;”

Lytell Geste of Robin Hode, Gutch," 1847, note, p. 365. in Rush Bearing, Alfred Burton, 1891

In 1853 the order at the front of the procession was: Derby Mercury - Wednesday 25 May 1853

1851 WOOTTON, William ('Old Piper') 1768 - 1851

"An inquest was held on the 14th inst., at the Locomotive Inn, in this place, by R. Weston, Esq., Coroner, on view
of the body of William Wootton, mason, aged 81 years. The deceased was well known in the neighbouring villages,
as the "Old Piper." It appears he retired to bed at 7 o'clock in the evening as usual, and about 6 o'clock next morning
he spoke to a boy, who left his room about that time, and at half past 8 was found dead in his bed.
Verdict - "Visitation of God."

The Banbury Guardian 24 April 1851

Mid 19th century - John Potter of Sutton, Oxfordshire
One of the best known and respected morris dance musicians in west Oxfordshire during the middle decades
of the nineteenth century was John Potter, of Sutton, a village adjacent to Stanton Harcourt.  He was renowned
over a wide area for playing the instrumental combination of three-holed pipe and tabor drum. 

At Ilmington, Warwickshire, for most of the nineteenth century the local morris was danced to a pipe and tabor:
three generations of the same family, from the founder George Arthur (1769-1836) from Snowshill, Warwickshire,
through his son Tom (1802-1890), a mason and grandson James (1828-1906), a carpenter.

“the pipe and tabor player, James Arthur, son of the original player, became too old to play, and as there was no one
to take his place, the dancing came to an abrupt conclusion”. Cecil Sharp. In 1908 a letter was written to the
Buckingham Advertiser and Free Press with a history of Ilmington Morris, including the fact that:

The pipe and taborer Nelson, got so drunk once that he had to be tied upright to a tree so he could continue playing.
He performed with several sides in north Oxfordshire. Good musicians were much in demand and sometimes played
on a strictly commercial basis for a sum of money agreed before-hand.

1860's the quoted fees for a pair of pipe and tabor players at Finstock were 5s. and 7s. per day
Sharp MSS, Folk Dance Notes, vol. 2, ff. 42-43

1858 Report on the Whitsun morris dancing at Bampton, Oxfordshire :
"The dancing was very creditably performed, but we cannot approve of the substitution of a squeaking fiddle
for the appropriate, and to our mind, orthodox "tabor and pipe"

Jackson's Oxford Journal of 29 May 1858, p 8

A former dancer of Leafield, Oxfordshire said:
"Their musician, John Williams, played fiddle and whittle and dub, but all preferred to dance to the latter"
Sharp, MS Folk Dance Notes, Clare College, Cambridge, vol I, p 79 in Micheal Heaney ‘Must every fiddler play a fiddle?’

until 1862 during The Whit Hunt in Oxfordshire:
“…While the hunters were gone, those who were left behind set up a Maypole on the village-green, and a party
of morris-dancers, accompanied by a fool and a pipe-and tabour player, gave an exhibition of their skill…."

‘Some Oxfordshire Seasonal Festivals’ Publications FOLK-LORE A QUARTERLY REVIEW  OF MYTH, TRADITION, INSTITUTION,
&-CUSTOM' The Transactions of the Folk-Lore Society

1863 play

“ But this is a day of enjoyment; away with business, and let the time be spent in pleasure.
[Pipe and tabor without.]
Ah! here come the morris dancers; you see I have not forgotten your taste for rural sports, my dear.
Sir Michael. You forget nothing, Lady Audley, that can minister to my amusement.
[He leads her to a garden seat, R. ]
Enter VILLAGERS, followed by MORRIS DANCERS, C., who perform a dance and exeunt

LADY AUDLEY'S SECRET first produced at the Royal Victoria Theatre, London, 25 May 1863

"25 May 1863: The morris-dancers made their appearance, but there was not much of novelty
in their proceedings or their dress; they still obstinately persist in employing a 
squeaking 'fiddle,' instead of the more legitimate tabor and pipe, notwithstanding
what had been said respecting it, and which considerably marred the effect of the whole." 
"The comments lamenting the substitution of the fiddle for the older musical combination
 of pipe and tabor were recurrent ones with that(anonymous) newspaper correspondent..." 

'Probably the most widely known gipsy for many a mile around': the life and musical activity of Thomas Boswell, aka Thomas 'Gypsy' Lewis' (1838-1910).
Jackson's Oxford, Journal, 30 May 1863, p. 8.

“Bucknell's Whit Ale survived until later … The scene of the festivities was the Rectory Barn…
There was dancing on the ground in front of the barn, as many as fifty couples dancing at a time.
  There were also morris-dancers... accompanied by a musician who carried a pipe and small drum.”

‘Whitsun in 19th century Oxfordshire’ by Howkins, Alun, 1974

1882, 13 May

"the minstrelsy of tuneful tabor, pipe, and horn the motley morrice dancers merrily mingling the throng! "

Staffordshire Advertiser

Notes on D'Arcy Ferris:
In 1885-1886 he had established himself as an enterprising and efficient organizer of fetes and public entertainments.

In the autumn of 1885, Ferris was beginning to look seriously for morris-dancers, for descriptions of dances,
and for a pipe and tabor. ... A letter 28 October 1885 offered Ferris an old tabor for five shillings, ...
Finding a pipe was more difficult...
Ferris met Joseph Powell: Powell wrote to Ferris on 26 February refusing to sell his pipe and tabor:
" 'i have playd it since you was up here and now i cant part with it sir"
The search for a living piper was a problem for Ferris...

Lectures: To conclude his lecture various 'relics of the Dance' were exhibited, a tabor 'more than 100 years old'
from Timothy Howard, gaiters and bells 'more than 50 years old' from Jonathon Harris, a pipe 'at least 200 years old':

Cheltenham Examiner - Wednesday 10 March 1886

A grand indoor pageant as part of a Charity Bazaar at the Agricultural Hall, Islington, on 8 May,
'Ye Right Merrie Sports of May Day' . In this he used the Bidford Morris as one element, although the
emphasis which reports placed on pipe and tabor and hobby-horse cause some doubt as to whether
a full side was actually there:

1886 ‘The May Queen at Islington, London’ Morning Post - Monday 10 May 1886

D'Arcy Ferris and the Bidford Morrisby Roy Judge
American Morris NewsletterRepring series 1994 number 3

1886 Ilmington morris newspaper advertisement: Alcester Chronicle - Saturday 19 June 1886

1891 Monmouthshire

at “…the coming-of-age celebrations of J. Maclaren-Rolls ... where the six male morris dancers
“attracted much attention by their contribution to the performance, … in excellent time to music dating
from the 13th century played by the piper and taborer”

‘The Ancient English Morris Dance’ 2023

1891" Old Meg of Herefordshire, for a Mayd Marian, and Hereford Toivnc for a Morris Daunce ; or
Twelve Morris Dauncers in Herefordshire of Twelve Hundred Years Old." It is dedicated : " To that renowned
Ox-leach, Old Hall, Taborer of Herefordshire , and to his most invincible, weather-beaten, Nutbrowne Tabor,
being alreadie old and sound, threescore years and upward…. Now, Twelve-pipe, that famous Southern Taberer
with the Cowleyan windpipe, who for whuling hath beene famous through the Globe of the world, did never gain
such renowne and credite by his pipe and Taber, as thou (old Hall), by striking up to these twelve hundred yeares
Morris-dauncers : Nor art thou alone (sweet Hall) a most exquisite Taber-man, but an excellent Oxe-leach, and
canst pleasure thy neighbours. The people of Herefordshire are beholding to thee, thou guist the men light hearts
by thy Pype, and the women light heeles by thy Taber : O wonderful Pyper, O admirable Taber-man,… thou,
sweet Hereford Hall bequeath in thy last will thy velom-spotted skin, to cover Tabors: at the sound of which to
set all the shires a dauncing...Next to him went old Harrie Rudge, the taborer. This was old Hall, of Hereford.
The waits of three metropolitan cities make not more music than he can, with his pipe and tabor,.."

Rush-Bearing : AN ACCOUNT OF THE OLD CUSTOM OF STREWING RUSHES CARRYING RUSHES TO CHURCH;
THE RUSH-CART; GARLANDS IN CHURCHES; MORRIS-DANCERS; THE WAKES ; THE RUSH. BY ALFRED BURTON page 136

1892

"In every parish they raised a May-pole hung with garlands and ribbons;.... And there was morris-dancing,
with Robin Hood, Friar Tuck, Little John, Tom the Piper, and Tom the Fool, with hobby-horses, pipe and tabor,
mummers and devils, and I know not what;"

London by Walter Besant

Crewe Chronicle - Saturday 31 March 1894

'Music and musicians of the 18th century', a lecture by  Mr F Cunningham Woods, showed a pipe and tabor  
otherwise known as ‘ whittle and dub’  formerly belonging to an inhabitant of Hailey.

Oxfordshire Weekly News - Wednesday 14 August 1895

1896 May Day procession

“At Charlton-on-Otmoor, Oxon, on May morning a procession used to start from the vicarage, headed by two men
carrying a large garland of flowers on a stick. With them went six morris-dancers, a fool or " Squire," who carried a
bladder and a money-box, and a man who played the pipe and tabour”

'Old English Customs Extant at the Present Time An Account of Local Observances Festival Customs and Ancient Ceremonies
yet Surviving in Great Britain' by T. H. Titchfield, London, 1896

1897 Arthur Sullivan's ballet ‘Victoria & Merrie England’ :

"Morrice Dancers and 6 lady morris dancers arrive and perform to a very attractive jaunty 6/8 theme
in which The Era again noted clever use of 'pipe and tabor' effects"

The Era - Saturday 29 May 1897

1897 Oxfordshire

Thomas Radbone played the pipe and tabour for morris dancing in Bampton;
as told by his daughter who was 80 in 1897

‘Some Oxfordshire Seasonal Festivals’ Publications FOLK-LORE A QUARTERLY REVIEW  OF MYTH, TRADITION, INSTITUTION, &-CUSTOM'
The Transactions of the Folk-Lore Societv

1898 ‘The Corporation Concerts at Wister Gardens by the Royal Marines Band. 
Leslie Stuart's march ‘The Dandy Fifth’ “suggests the morris tabor and pipe”

Cheltenham Examiner - Wednesday 12 October 1898

1899 In a newspaper review entitled ‘Exhibition of morris dancing – an interesting revival’ at the Corn Exchange in Oxford,
the reviewer noted :

“During the interval Mr Manning exhibited the pipe, tabor (drum) and bells used by the Headington Morris Dancers
upwards of 70 years ago.”

Oxford Journal - Saturday 18 March 1899