This one was composed by Mike Craver, an original member of one of my all-time favourite American groups, the Red Clay Ramblers. After leaving the Ramblers, Craver released a clutch of fine solo albums. 'Argonne Wood' is on his 'Shining Down' album.

ARGONNE WOOD                                                         
(Mike Craver)

Billy Leonard was a boy from here
A stout-hearted fellow, Billy knew no fear
He learned about the war from the newsreels
He’d seen in the movie house
Billy figured that he’d take a chance
He joined the army and he sailed for France
He’d give that Kaiser a kick in the pants
Any good man should
The officer said, ‘Don’t you worry, son
‘We’re gonna give the dickens to the lousy Hun
‘And when we’ve blown ‘em all to kingdom come
‘We’ll cross and make our claim’

Oh Billy, don’t you weep no more
You lost your battle but you won our war
Just like we knew you could
There’s no pretty ladies where the poppies grow
Nobody told you what you had to know
The only ones who could
Lay buried in the Argonne Wood

And the orders come and the whistles blow
Up from the trenches all the laddies go
They looked at each other, but how could they know
They’d be cut down like the grain
They said it’ll all be over in forty-two days
The world situation would improve in ways
But none could see it through the murky haze
That billowed from an unjust cause

Oh Billy, don’t you weep no more
You lost your battle but you won our war
Just like we knew you would
There’s no pretty ladies where the poppies grow
Nobody told you what you had to know
The only ones who could
Lay buried in the Argonne Wood

Billy had it better than some of his friends
He’s still alive and he still pretends
But sometimes at night, he prays for an end
To the hell of his same old dream
He’s come back home to his family’s care
He wears his medals as he sits in his chair
But his legs are gone and his soul’s not there
He’d claim it if he could
Deep in the Argonne Wood

Oh Billy don’t you weep no more
You lost your battle but you won our war
Just like we knew you could
No big parades where the poppies grow
Nobody told you what you had to know
The only ones who could
Lay deep in the Argonne Wood

Youtube clip

The greatest American battle of WWI is largely forgotten today. The Meuse-Argonne Offensive, also known as the Battle of the Argonne Forest, was part of the final Allied offensive that stretched along the entire Western Front. It was fought from 26 September 1918 until Armistice on 11 November. During those 47 days, the American Expeditionary Force had over 26 000 killed and almost 96 000 wounded, making it the largest and bloodiest of the war for the Americans. The majority of their ground forces fought their way through rough, hilly terrain that the German army had spent 4 years fortifying. The aim was to capture the railway hub at Sedan which would break the German railway support network. Coupled with British and French offensives elsewhere on the Western Front, the assault through Argonne was critical in breaking German resistance and bringing the war to an end. Mike Craver noted: ‘Argonne Wood was inspired by my mother’s writings about life and coming of age in the little North Carolina crossroads community where I was born’.

--Stewie.