The Parson & the Songmen

music, history, arts · EN-GB

The Reverend Sabine Baring Gould was an exceptional parson and squire from Devonshire, England. He is probably best remembered as the composer of the hymn 'Onward Christian Soldiers'. Born in Exeter in 1834, he died at his estate, Lewtrenchard Manor in West Devon, in 1924. As 2024 is the centenary of his death it gives me the opportunity to spotlight what he considered to be the most important achievement of his life, that of collecting the old folk songs of Devonshire, and later Cornwall, as he termed it, 'from the mouths of the people'. Join me as I tell stories about, and sing songs from, this far from ordinary Victorian country parson as he travelled by pony and trap across his native Devonshire seeking out songs that now form a major part of the English folk song tradition.