Quilter dedicated it to and named it after his nephew Arnold Guy Vivian, who perished at the hands of German forces in Italy in 1943.
[8] Arnold Vivian joined the Grenadier Guards (6th Battalion) at the start of World War II[5] and in 1942 left England for active service.
[7] At around the same time Quilter started working on eleven new arrangements of old songs, to have something to welcome his nephew home from the war.
Some months later he and his friend Lord Brabourne, also from the 6th Battalion, were being transported by train from an Italian POW camp to Germany, and they escaped near Bronzolo in the South Tyrol.
[1][5] Bennett's words to "The Ash Grove" were written in direct response to news of Arnold Vivian's death.
[2] Also, the words to "My Lady Greensleeves" are attributed to an Irish poet named John Irvine, and differ from the traditional ones.
[1] Roger Quilter's friend Percy Grainger was very favourably impressed with the Arnold Book of Old Songs.
He wrote: They are a lovely string of gems, most touching in their humanity & typical of the heart-revealing skill you have built up of weaving such tune-enhancing arabesques & comments round the melody in the accompaniment – comments that inject new meaning into the line & text of the melody ... How right of you to have prepared this nose-gay for your beloved Kinsman, & to have dedicated them to his memory, since he could not return to enjoy them.