Subject: A seasonal offering?
From:
Fiolar
Date: 23 Dec 01 - 12:18 PM
Here is a little seasonal offering, which I picked up from Irish radio some time ago. Composed by Cormac McConnell, it is sung by Jerry Lynch. And yes I know, the First World War event described took place at Christmas 1914, but that in no way detracts from the beauty of the song. Enjoy.
Christmas 1915
1.
1915 on Christmas Day,
On the Western Front the guns all died away.
And lying in the mud on bags of sand,
We heard a German sing in No Man?s Land.
He had a tenor voice so pure and true;
The words were strange, but every note we knew.
Soaring over the living, dead and damned,
A German sang of peace in No Man?s Land.
Chorus:
Oh Silent Night, no cannons roar.
A King is born of peace for evermore.
All?s calm; all?s bright; all brothers hand in hand,
In 19 and 15 in No Man?s Land.
2.
They left their trenches and we left ours.
Beneath tin hats, the smiles bloomed like wild flowers.
With photos, cigarettes and tots of wine
We built a soldiers? truce on the front line.
Their singer was a lad of twenty-one.
We begged another song before the dawn.
And sitting in the mud and blood and fear,
He sang again the song all longed to hear.
Chorus:
Oh Silent Night, no cannons roar.
A King is born of peace for evermore.
All?s calm; all?s bright; all brothers hand in hand.
It?s gas and rusty wire in No Man?s Land.
3.
And in the morning all the guns boomed in the rain;
And we killed them, and they killed us again,
With bayonet, bomb, bullet, gas and flame,
And neither we nor they at all to blame.
There was heavy fighting right throughout the day.
For one night?s peace we bloodily did pay.
At night they charged; we fought them hand to hand;
And I killed the boy who sang in No Man?s Land.
Chorus:
Oh Silent Night, no cannons roar.
A King is born of peace for evermore.
All?s calm; all?s bright; all brothers hand in hand.
And that young soldier sings;
And sound of peace still rings,
O?er the captains and the kings in No Man?s Land.
Sleep in heavenly peace.
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sj