TROOPERS LAMENT

Utah Phillips

I sailed from Seattle far away from friends and home,
Far across the blue Pacific to the Land of Morning Calm,
Here's your helmet and your rifle, and your prophylactics too,
And as sure as I'm your captain we will make a man of you.

Oh the 105's were pounding and their thunder shook the night,
I asked my bold commander who am I here to fight,
"It's the slopes, and the slants, the gooks and chinks," said he,
And I wondered if their captain ever said the same as me.

I have seen the mountain winter where the air was cold and still,
But, oh, that frozen Chosan it was a living hell,
With the fever and the jaundice and a hundred kinds of mold,
We were slaughtered in our mummy bags by bayonets and cold.

And everywhere I traveled from the camps at Kummaree(?),
The Yungsan reservation and the camps at Moonsamee(?),
The golden plains of Inchon, my boots rotting on my feet,
All I heard were starving babies while their mothers walked the street.

We bought cameras, we bought watches, we bought whores and we bought booze,
With the little barefoot beggars bending down to shine our shoes,
We gave them back our candy, and to answer our desire,
We gave them round eyed babies who died outside the wire.

I got off in Seattle and climbed on board a train,
I rode it through the mountains with a fever in my brain,
I could find no reason to remain here anymore,
There was no trace around me of the life I'd lived before.

Where's the pride in country if it robs a man of will,
And where's the pride in manhood if a man will rape and kill,
And where's the pride in killing if the dead will rise again,
Ah, but there's a pride in knowing there's an enemy within.

So listen all you troopers here's a lesson you should know,
From an older brown shoe soldier who marched off long ago,
They will use your pride and passion for to settle all their fights,
Keep yor pride in your trousers and the captain in your sights.

Utah wrote this to express his feelings about his service in Korea, which he had trouble talking about. specifically, it was for his son who had just joined the Marines. He used a tune that he said he'd heard Louis Killen sing.. Anyone out there know which ballad this was from?

Mark Ross