Improved barrel organ, painted label on case: ‘T.C. Bates & SON, Organ Builders, 6, LUDGATE HILL, LONDON’. Purchased from St John the Baptist, Meopham, in 1865. It seems likely that alterations were made and additional barrels purchased at this time by another builder, since T.C. Bates & Son ceased trading at around this time. In 1950 it was reported that ‘a few years ago’ the organ ‘was used for the children's service on Sunday afternoons.’ The organ is operated from the rear and blown by pedal. The Gothic case has three panels of gold painted dummy pipes. Part-restored in 1950 by Noel Mander for the Kent Music Exhibition, then dismantled and stored at Rochester Museum. Part-restored again in 2013 by David Shuker: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74iUp21nmoM. Now in Snodland Millennium Museum. Tunes recorded in 2013. Originally 3 barrels (later 6, now 1) x 10 tunes. Some tunes have been repinned and three additional barrels supplied, perhaps when the organ was purchased from Meopham – the handwritten c.1865 tunelist includes several tunes published in Hymns Ancient & Modern and other 1860s hymnals. Names pasted over several tunes indicate that further alterations were made. Only barrel 5 survives. Recordings of barrel 5 and photo: David Shuker.

References: Musical Times (1 Oct. 1899) p.659; Musical Opinion (Jul. 1906) p.752; Notes and Queries (1924); Northampton Chronicle and Echo (11 Sep. 1926) p.2; Country Life (15 Dec. 1928) p.884 & (24 Mar. 1966); Sunday Times (16 Apr. 1950); Kentish Express (2 Jan. 1959) p.6; Boston (1959); Boston & Langwill (1967); Ord-Hume (1978); Turner (2002); Kilbey (2013); David Shuker, At the Sign of the Pipe https://signofthepipe.blogspot.com/2013/03/the-trottiscliffe-barrel- organ.html; Trottiscliffe Village Barrel Organ http://www.trottiscliffevillage.co.uk/Barrel%20Organ.html