The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #16460   Message #153553
Posted By: Mick Lowe
23-Dec-99 - 07:01 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Req: Broad Black Brimmer (Irish song)
Subject: Lyr Add: THE BROAD BLACK BRIMMER
JIm
You can find this and lots like it HERE
But as it's the Christmas season, here are the lyrics

THE BROAD BLACK BRIMMER

There's a uniform that's hanging in what's known as father's room
A uniform so simple in its style
It has no braid of gold or silk, no hat with feathered plume
Yet me mother has preserved it all the while
One day she made me try it on, a wish of mine for years
In memory of your father , son she said
And when I put the Sam Brown on she was smiling with the tears
As she placed the broad black brimmer on my head

Chorus:
It's just a broad black brimmer with its ribbons frayed and torn
By the careless whisk of manny's mountain breeze
And old trench coat that's batlle stained and worn
And breeches almost thread bare at the knees
A Sam Brown belt with buckle big and strong
A holster that's been empty many's a day
When men claim Ireland's freedom,
The one should choose to lead them
Will wear the broad black brimmer of the I.R.A.

It was the uniform been worn by me father long ago
When he reached me mother's homestead on the run
It was the uniform me father wore in that little church below
When oul Father Mac. He blessed the pair as one
And after truce and treaty and the parting of the ways
He wore it when he marched out with the rest
And when they bore his body down that rugged heather braes
They placed the broad black brimmer on his breast


Cheers
Mick