Erik Darling, the reedy-voiced guitarist and banjo player who deftly stepped in when Pete Seeger left the pioneering folk music group The Weavers, has died after battling lymphoma. He was 74.

He died Sunday in Chapel Hill, not far from Raleigh.

Darling was perhaps best known for his hit "Walk Right In" and for his arrangement of the iconic Southern true-crime ballad "Tom Dooley," which inspired The Kingston Trio's recording of the song that topped the charts in 1958. He was a member of the Tarriers, known for its version of "The Banana Boat Song (Day-O)" - the signature tune of Harry Belafonte.

Darling also replaced Seeger in the Weavers in the late 1950s, a few years after the band was blacklisted for its political views.
Fred Hellerman, an original member of the group, said he learned of his friend's death by e-mail earlier this week.

"He was immensely talented - immensely talented," Hellerman, 81, said Thursday in a telephone interview from his home in Weston, Conn. "When he came into the Weavers to replace Pete Seeger, which was a pretty tall order, he not only did that, but he brought so much of his own talents to bear that it was overwhelming. It really was."

Hellerman said Darling moved to Chapel Hill a couple of years ago to be near Willard Svanoe, a fellow member of The Rooftop Singers, the band with which he recorded "Walk Right In," a No. 1 hit for Vanguard Records in 1963.

In an e-mail posted on Darling's Web site, Svanoe said Darling died early Aug. 3.

The Weavers first burst on the scene in 1948 in Greenwich Village and had their first national hit in 1950 with "Goodnight Irene." But during the red scare of the 1950s, their politics came under scrutiny and the group was brought in to testify before the House Committee on Un-American Activities.

They soon found themselves blacklisted, and disbanded in 1953. It wasn't until a Christmas 1955 concert at Carnegie Hall that they re-emerged to rejoin the national folk music revival they'd helped launch.

"He was an absolutely logical person to be brought in" after Seeger's departure, Hellerman said. "Of the next generation of Weavers, I mean he was so outstanding that it was hard then or even now to imagine who else we could have brought in other than Erik."

Hellerman said he didn't learn until many years later that Darling was uncomfortable with his band mates' leftist leanings.

Hellerman said they last spoke about a year ago, but he had received a package from Darling in the mail a couple of weeks ago. It was a copy of Darling's recently published memoir, "I'd Give My Life - A Journey by Folk Music." Hellerman said he couldn't put it down.

Hellerman said he had been meaning to write to Darling and tell him how much he enjoyed the book.

"My big regret is that I didn't get to do it," he said. "I did have the chance, but I didn't take advantage of it."

Funeral arrangements were handled by the Cremation Society of the Carolinas in Raleigh.

Eric Dowling

PoW at Stalag Luft III who helped his comrades prepare for the Great Escape

07 Aug 2008

Eric Dowling, who died on July 21 aged 92, was among the PoWs in Stalag Luft III whose exploits later became celebrated in the Hollywood film The Great Escape (1963); Dowling himself was not among those who attempted to get out of the camp, but played a valuable part in the preparations, which culminated in 76 men breaking for freedom on March 24 1944.

In all, 250 PoWs had been due to make the attempt through three tunnels christened Tom, Dick and Harry - Tom, however, was discovered by the guards, and Dick was used to store the earth excavated from Harry.

The remaining "live" tunnel, whose entrance was concealed beneath a stove in one of the huts, ended up being too short to allow the airmen to emerge in the nearby woodland, and they had to make a dash for it over open ground; 76 men managed this undetected, but the 77th was spotted by a sentry and the attempt was over. All but three of the prisoners were recaptured, 50 of them - all officers - later being executed on Hitler's orders.

Although Flight Lieutenant Dowling himself was not one of those chosen to break out, he had played his part in preparing forged identity documents and passes for the escapers.

He also offered his skills to the map-making department and also lent a hand in the tunnel-digging process, earning the nickname "Digger" Dowling. Seven of the officers who were later shot were among his close friends.

Dowling kept a detailed record of his life in Stalag Luft III, where he was incarcerated for nearly three years. During this period he learned five languages, and noted meticulously every one of the 411 books he read - these included works of fiction such as Beverley Nichols's Patchwork and Charlotte Brontë's Shirley, and biographies of Pepys, Shakespeare, Dickens and Oscar Wilde.

He also recorded every piece of music he listened to on the gramophone and every item of mail he received (when it arrived, and what it contained). At the camp the PoWs organised a cricket team to represent each of the English counties, and Dowling was captain of "Somerset", his birthplace; he also recorded the scores of every match played.

Eric Perry Dowling was born at Glastonbury on July 22 1915, the son of a businessman who ran a company at Taunton selling animal foods. Eric's mother died when he was 13, and he was sent to Taunton School, where he much enjoyed life as a boarder and excelled at cricket and swimming. After completing his education he worked for his father until the outbreak of the war, when he joined the RAF.

The young Dowling trained as a navigator in South Africa and was then attached to No 57 Squadron based at Feltwell, in Norfolk. He flew 29 missions in Wellington bombers over Germany before, in April 1942, being shot down over Hamburg and imprisoned at Stalag Luft III in occupied Poland.

After being liberated in 1945 he was sent by the RAF as an air crash investigator to Norway, where he met his future wife, Marie; they married in January 1946 after a six-week courtship.

Having returned to England, Dowling again worked for his father before finding a job with British Aerospace at Filton, Bristol. He acted as a procurer of parts for Concorde and remained with the company until he was 65. In retirement he continued to enjoy playing cricket and tennis, and he and his wife played bridge to county standard. Marie Dowling died in 1997.

Dowling had little time for Hollywood's portrayal of The Great Escape, which imagines Steve McQueen soaring over the perimeter wire on a stolen German motorcycle; the former PoW considered the film to be "well over the top".

Eric Dowling is survived by his son and daughter.