I grant that some considerable mystery surrounds my grandfather's most famous song (though, in Britain, "Take Me Back To Dear Old Blighty" ranks among the immortals, too). I have listened to the Library of Congress recording, at Guest Lighter at Work's suggestion. There is a resemblance for a couple of bars (the part that in the printed lyrics goes "They say there's a troopship that's leaving Bombay") but thereafter it veers off. Not enough, I argue, to credit the earlier song as the origin of Godfrey's tune. That is not to say, however, that Godfrey couldn't have borrowed from an earlier source -- happens all the time. For that matter, a line in "Old Sailor", a 1936 song by Godfrey and Jimmy Kennedy, shows up virtually intact in Irving Berlin's "White Christmas", but I wouldn't claim partial authorship of the latter song by Godfrey nor would I accuse Berlin of stealing it.

Why Godfrey's name doesn't appear on printed sheet music of "Bless 'Em All" is a big puzzle -- all the composing rights societies credit him nonetheless, and someone in the family (not me) has been collecting the royalties all these years. Why, indeed, didn't he publish the thing in 1917 or thereabouts? And what were the original lyrics? I've no idea, but I'm certainly glad to know that there is some interest in discovering the true story behind "Bless 'Em All," and if it turns out that my grandfather didn't write the thing after all, I promise to be gracious about it!

, and I