MRS ANN WOLFENDALE, of 8 Mill Street, Stalybridge, has been most interested in the recent articles in the Reporter about the writing of the song “Tipperary”. For Mrs. Wolfendale, now 85 lived at the Newmarket Tavern, Stalybridge, and can remember hearing the song when it was sung there for the very first time! “I can remember Jack Judge singing the song in the tap room. We didn’t think much of it then - it was just another song,” Mrs. Wolfendale told the Reporter. There was a

In 1934, a letter from Jack Judge to a Mr. Whittaker, a shopkeeper in Stalybridge, Cheshire, came to light and told how the song came to be written. Just after midnight on the 31st of January 1912, Judge emerged from a club in stalybridge with his friends, having bet one Frank Newberry five shillings that he could write compose and sing a new song that day. On the way to his lodgings in Portland Place, he overheard one man say to another ‘it’s a long way to . . . . . “ The ph

B. FELDMAN AND CO. LTD. MUSIC PUBLISHERS 64 DEAN STREET, LONDON, WIV 6AU HW/OB 16th March, 1972. Mr. E. Anthony Lewis, St. Paul's Vicarage, Huddersfield Road, Stalybridge, Cheshire. Dear Sir. In reply to your letter concerning "IT'S A LONG WAY TO TIPPERARY". As the publishers of the song we cannot enter into any controversy regarding who did or did not write it. We have heard it mentioned before, but we would like to say that we have paid 'royalties' to both Jack Judge and Ha

"It's a Long Way to Tipperary" is a British music hall song written by Jack Judge. It was allegedly written for a 5 shilling bet in Stalybridge on 30 January 1912 and performed the next night at the local music hall. Judge's parents were Irish, and his grandparents came from Tipperary. It became popular among soldiers in the First World War and is remembered as a song of that war. The Irish regiment the Connaught Rangers were witnessed singing this song as they marched throug