Frank Purslow on melodeon, Roy Shergold dancing a jig

Sam Bennett born (1865-1951) from Ilmington, a frequent dancer and musician in Bampton, this photo dated 1920
Sam had the distinction of being called “a rotter” by Cecil Sharp. He was responsible for reviving the Morris tradition in the Warwickshire village of Ilmington. Although a fiddle player himself, he learned the tunes from a local pipe and tabor player, Tom Foster, who “no longer had enough teeth to hold the pipe in place” In the process of reviving the dances, Bennett did some improving and inventing along the way. To Sharp, this was inexcusable meddling; what he most treasured about traditional dance was that is was supposedly not the work of individual creativity, but of centuries of continuous evolution by the common, preferably uneducated people. Bennett was recorded in 1933 by a Harvard academic, James Madison Carpenter. Being a self-taught fiddler, and having learned his tunes directly from a piper, it is little wonder that his playing, though very rhythmic, was plain and unadorned except with frequent open-string drones.

Dancers at Shipston on Stour June 23rd 1930.
Arnold Buckingham. Billy Flux, Reg Tanner, Jim Buckingham, Bert Hunt, Vic Tanner, Ted Lay, Sam Bennet on fiddle

Photo taken by Bernard Rose of dancers at Bampton House 1994

Bampton Traditional Morris Dancers at Churchgate House in 1987 or 88
Terry Rouse as fool

Bampton Morris Men under Squire Francis Shergold.
At Winster Day of Dance September 1983

Photo of Bill Daniels, Bampton Traditional Morris Dancers 1980

Bill Daniels, Bampton Morris Dancers, dancing in the Deanery possibly 1980

Photo of The Morris Dancers coming down Church Street outside the Eagle Pub with some names
Bill Daniels, Ralph Harrison, Tony Daniels, Jim Buckingham