Origins: The Battle of Shiloh's Hill

Subject: Origins: The Battle of Shiloh Hill
From: Lighter
Date: 12 Jun 20 - 08:15 PM

It's surprising that so little has been written (here or anywhere) about one of the most powerful songs made during the Civil War.

Its earliest printed appearance was in Francis D. Allan, ed., "Allan's Lone Star Ballads: A Collection of Southern Patriotic Songs Made During Confederate Times" (Galveston: Sawyer, 1874):

                                  THE BATTLE OF SHILOH HILL.

    BY M. B. SMITH, OF CO. C, SECOND REGIMENT TEXAS VOLUNTEERS.

                                  Air— Wandering Sailor.

Come all you valiant soldiers, and a story I will tell,
It is of a noted battle you all remember well;
It was an awful strife, and will cause your blood to chill,
It was the famous battle that was fought on Shiloh Hill!

It was the sixth of April, just at the break of day,
The drums and fifes were playing for us to march away;
The feeling of that hour I do remember still,
For the wounded and the dying that lay on Shiloh Hill.

About the hour of sunrise the battle it began,
And before the (lay had vanished we fought them hand to hand;
The horrors of the field did my heart with anguish fill,
For the wounded and the dying that lay ou Shiloh Hill.

There were men of ev'ry nation laid on those bloody plains.
Fathers, sons, and brothers were numbered, with the slain,
That has caus'd so many homes with deep mourning to be fill'd,
All from the bloody battle that was fought on Shiloh Hill.

The wounded men were crying for help from everywhere,
While others, who were dying, were offering God their prayer,
'Protect my wife and children, if it is thy holy will!"
Such were the prayers I heard that night on Shiloh Hill.

And early the next morning, we were call'd to arms again,
Unmindful of the wounded and unmindful of the slain,
The struggle was renewed, and ten thousand men were kill'd;
This was the second conflict of the famous Shiloh Hill.

The battle it raged on, though dead and dying men
Lay thick all o'er the ground, on the hill and on the glen,
And from their deadly wounds their blood ran like a rill;
Such were the mournful sights that I saw on Shiloh Hill.

Before the day was ended the battle ceased to roar,   
And thousands of brave soldiers had fell to rise no more;
They left their vacant ranks for some other ones to fill,
And now their mouldering bodies all lie on Shiloh Hill.

And now my song is ended about those bloody plains,
I hope the sight by mortal man may ne'er be seen again;
But I pray to God, the Saviour, "if consistent with thy will,
To save the souls of all who fell on bloody Shiloh Hill!"

A very similar text is printed in the St. John's Review (Portland, Ore.) (June 19, 1914). It was attributed to "J.T. Holley 9th Missouri Cavalry and 18th Illinois Infantry."

The lyrics reappeared anonymously in the Weekly Thibodaux (La.) Sentinel (Aug. 2, 1879), but the air is given as “The Watcher.’

An Ozark version, clearly derived from the above, appeared in Vance Randolph's "Ozark Folk Songs." The song was made familiar to the “revival” through appearing in Irwin Silber’s “Songs of the Civil War” (1960) and Alan Lomax’s “Folk Songs of North America” (1965).

The Pickens (S.C.) Sentinel printed another very similar text on April 15, 1915. Its chief distinction is a division into quatrains, with a chorus of “Sing carry me away,/ Oh, carry me away.” The text is introduced with the following note:

      “Mr. Editor: Will you please pint this song in memory of my dear father,
       Joe Berry Rigdon, who left this world November. 26, 1911, and who
       dearly loved it? I have heard him talk about the battle of Shiloh many
       times. [Signed] Mrs. Nannie Rigdon Massengill.”

In the Iron County (Mo.) Register (June 2, 1910), a Mr. F. Hilburn mentioned “On the Top of Shiloh Hill” as among the songs he sang in his youth.

The text in the DT radically adds a melodramatic scene in which the narrator (a Union soldier) unwittingly kills his Confederate father in battle, is from West Virginia. Alice Wylde sings it on “Songs of Old Appalachia” (2013).

“Allan’s Lone Star Ballads” includes several other lyrics credited to M. B.Smith: “The Land of Texas,” “The Glorious January 1, 1863,” “Hard Times!” “The Lone Texas Star,” “The Gallant Second Texians,” and “The Frontier Ranger.”

I have found no further information on M. B. Smith except that he lived in or near Galveston after the war. I don’t know whether he was an officer or an enlisted man in the Second Texas. “The Frontier Ranger” suggests the possibility that he once belonged to the Texas Rangers. (No information on J. T. Holley seems to be available either.) If Smith was the author of “Shiloh Hill,” his view of the battle in “The Gallant Second Texians” was more conventional:

       'Twas at the Shiloh battle they first did hear the cry,
       The cannons loudly rattle, and bullets rattle by—
       They rush'd forth like lions' whelps upon the dastard foe;
       Away, o'er dead and dying, behold them onward go!

Subject: RE: Origins: The Battle of Shiloh's Hill
From: cnd
Date: 12 Jun 20 - 09:42 PM

While Wayne Erbsen and Bobby Horton (the usual suspects) have nice renditions of the song, and other versions can be heard by the the 97th Regimental String Band and Jim Taylor (whose version closely matches the version in the DT), my favorite version I've found of the song is by the band Lonesome Ride. Gary G. Smith, their lead singer, sang it in a simple and straightforward way, without accompaniment from instrumental backing. I bought their CD (Crossing the Wall) and the booklet which accompanies it, but unfortunately neither gave much insight into their arrangement of the song, though the lyrics were substantially a shorter version of the ones you provided above.

You and most older sources cite the song as from M. B. Smith, but a few sources I've found (such as here and here - though this link also talks some about the song's history) link the song to an M. G. Smith -- probably the derivative of a typo somewhere down the line.

The attribution to Smith seems more likely to me. There is a known soldier to that name in the 2nd Regiment, Texas Infantry, Co. C (link) - he was a private throughout his known enlistment.

Further, M. B. Smith seems to have been quite the lyricist, writing this song, The Frontier Ranger, The Glorious January 1, 1863, Hard Times, and probably other songs.

Regarding this song, I found a reference from 1887 which gives as its citation the singing of a Confederate prisoner in 1864, which can be found in The Girard Press, June 18th, 1887, p. 1.

After reading several early copies of the song, the DT lyrics seem to be a modern modification of the song, with the father-fighting elements added in later for dramatic effect.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Battle of Shiloh's Hill
From: Lighter
Date: 13 Jun 20 - 10:15 AM

Thanks for the link to Smith.

There's no compelling reason to question Smith's authorship of the songs Allan attributes to him, but "Shiloh Hill" is so distinctive in outlook and style   as to raise an eyebrow.

The same might be said of "The Frontier Ranger."

Subject: RE: Origins: The Battle of Shiloh's Hill
From: Lighter
Date: 13 Jun 20 - 01:17 PM

I've turned up some additional references. The words were rather well known in the South and Midwest.

I’ve looked at the 1887 example in the Girard (Kans. ) Press (June 18, 1887), p.1.

It was sent on June 1 by R.C. Freeman of Mulberry Grove, Kans., as a "song ballad" preserved in writing, which had been "presented to me by a Confederate prisoner at Jackson, Miss., in 1864." So Freeeman seems to have received a written rather than merely a sung copy. It's virtually identical to the Allan version.

"Said prisoner," Freeman continues, "told me the song was composed by a rebel soldier on the battle field of Shiloh."

A text appeared a little earlier in the Princeton (Ind.) Clarion (Apr. 23, 1885), p. 2, "Re-published by special request." This differs very slightly from the 1874 (and alleged 1864) texts: the biggest difference is that "ten thousand men were killed" is replaced by "ten thousand 'foot the bill.'"

Also virtually identical to Allan's is the version in the Marion County (Ala.) (May 28, 1896), p. 8, "By request of a young lady reader of the News." Its only real novelty is "the truth to you I'll tell" in place of "a story I will tell."

We should be made cautious of any claim to authorship of any traditional song by the note introducing the ballad in the Newton (N.C.) Enterprise (Feb. 15, 1906), p. 1: "Written for the Newton Enterprise...[by] W. T. Cline." In this case, the "horror of the fighting" fills the singer's heart not with "anguish" but with "anger." Notable too is the absence of the prayer to save the souls of "all" who died. The quatrain arrangement and a "Sing carry me away,/ Sing carry me away" refrain, are as in the 1915 N.C. version.

The Evening Star (Independence, Kans.) quotes a single line on Aug. 10, 1908, p. 8: "It was a fearful slaughter, and it made the blood to chill." But the occasion is only to compare a local baseball game to the battle of Shiloh!

The Asher (Okla.) Clipper (May 21, 1909), p. 12, credits its text (Allan's) to "B.F. Arthur, in the Dallas News."

"The Battle of Shiloh," in the Purcell (Okla. )Republic (Nov. 10, 1910), p. 3, "was handed to us by John McDevitt. The card was carried in the Civil War by Mr. McDevitt's grandfather, who purchased it from a blind soldier during the war. " Again, virtually Allan's text, except that "valiant" soldiers are now "veteran" soldiers, and the singer’s feet were “tramping on the side of Shiloh hill.”

The text in the Hartshorne (Okla.) Sun (Oct. 1, 1914), p. 3, was “Copied by T. H. O’Kelley.” Here, “our feet were trailing the top” of Shiloh hill.

In 1915 Mr. E. J. Curtis requested the Weekly Town Talk (Alexandria, La.) to print the song, which it did on June 16, p. 11. The text was supplied by Mrs. E. C. Blanton, of Mixon, Texas.

Unremarkable texts also appeared in the Dewar (Okla.) Telegram (Mar. 7, 1918) and the Union (Miss.) Appeal (Oct. 28, 1926).

The Cedar Rapids Gazette (Apr. 6, 1918), p. 3, credits the “poem” to “the pen of Mr. [William E.] Varney,” of Cedar Rapids, a Union veteran. It “gives, in verse, his impressions of the battle.”