White Silk Dress, The

AKA She wore a white silk dress
First Published 1897
Writer/composer AJ Mills and Bennett Scott Roud RN24189

Music Hall Performers Decima Moore, Lily Lena
Folk performances Collected from the singing of:
Costello, Cecilia; England: Warwickshire; 1967
Webber, Samuel; England: West Midlands; 1971		 

As recalled in The Scottish Referee, 27 March 1903
She wore a white silk dress 
And a dainty shoe, 
A saucy little hat, 
Neatly trimmed with blue, 
And poor old Jones had to confess 
He was gone upon the lady 
In the white silk dress.

I have only been able to find the chorus of this song (thus far), though from library catalogues the first line is: Jones, a bachelor stiff and staid. Its another song from the 1890s by the prolific songwriter AJ Mills with music by Bennett Scott. It was sung in the Halls by light opera singer Decima Moore and comedian Lily Lena. Several contemporary recordings were made, but at the time of writing they don’t appear to be available online.

Lily Lena (born 1877-1958), known as Lal, was a relative of Marie Lloyd and in the early 90s performed with her cousin Rosie Lloyd as “The Sisters Lena”. She went solo in 1896 and within a year had a hit with The White Silk Dress. She performed in Britain and America until the 1920s.

The chorus of the song was collected from the singing of Samuel Webber in 1971 (listen to it in the British library Sound archive) and Cecilia Costello in 1967 – a recording is available at the Vaughan Williams Memorial library site

Sources: