The Convalescent Home song

My mother used to sing me a song she'd learned as an in-patient in what was called a Convalescent Home - a residential children's home for youngsters recovering from the more debilitating diseases of childhood abroad in those days. In my mother's case, 'those days' were the 1920s and early 30s.  As far as I can recall, my mother was recovering from Scarlet Fever, a type of Strep that does not stop at the throat and causes the skin to break out in bright red sandpapery spots. Although it can come with a high fever, it's not considered particularly dangerous in the 21st century, with our rapidly-waning antibiotics, but at the time it was a serious childhood disease that could take weeks of recovery with attention from trained nurses.
Many children in Convalescent Homes were recovering from other diseases of the age, including the dreaded Diphtheria, Corynebacterium diphtheriae, which coats the lungs with a thick, grey biofilm and attacks other organs, and polio, a childhood viral paralysis which in the worst cases could prevent the child being able to breathe on their own, and for which they would sleep in 'iron lungs', a metal tube which enclosed the whole body, leaving the head outside, so that the inside could be used as a pump to operate the lungs. There were the other childhood diseases as well, measles, mumps, rubella, chicken pox and some others.
Convalescent Homes were for children who were past the acute phase of the disease and had to be classified as non-contagious before they were admitted. Some would be there for months.
For some reason, all the Convalescent Homes had a version of the same song my mother sang. Sometimes the disease changed (rheumatic fever, scarlet fever, diphtheria) and sometimes the names of the nurses or doctors changes (Dr Annister, Dr Aniston, Dr Canister) but all had the same plaintive chorus -
Mummy, Daddy, take me home
From this Convalescent Home

I've looked for it on Youtube, to no avail, although there are people all over the interwebs recalling the song from their childhood, from the 20s to the 60s, with many saying they sang it or know someone who sang it to them.  One said it was to the tune of The Laughing Policeman, which the verse is, but my mother sang the chorus differently (obviously as it would just be screams of laughter).
The song came into my head the other day - before the Coronavirus hit, in case you're wondering - and I looked up the song and wrote a story based on it for my writing class. I'll put the story in a separate post. Here's the version my mother sang, with a couple of bits filled in by me. (For example, I can't for the life of me remember the name of the home.) If you ask Google (tm) you can find other versions.


I had that scarlet fever, 

I had it very bad
They wrapped me up in blankets 

And put me in the van
The van was very bumpy, 

 nearly tumbled out, 

And when I got to Tadworth Court 

I heard a patient shout,

Mummy, Daddy, take me home, 

From this convalescent home.
I’ve been here a year or two, 

Now I want to be with you.

In comes Dr. Annister, 

Sliding down the banister.
"Are you better, are you worse? 

Oh my goodness, where’s that nurse?"
In comes nurse with a red hot poultice, 

Slaps it on and takes no notice. 

"Oh, said the patient, that’s too hot.
“Oh, says the nurse. I’m sure it’s not."

Goodbye all the patients, goodbye all the nurses,
Goodbye all the doctors, and jolly old matron too.

I don't know of anyone who thought of the matron as "jolly" - most recall a certain amount of lack of patience on the part of the nurses, if not outright physical punishment. Everyone, including my mother, was very glad to get home.