The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #171632 Message #4151496
Posted By: Joe Offer
30-Aug-22 - 12:56 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Add: The Countersigns
Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Countersigns
This is from All Hands, the Bureau of Naval Personnel Information Bulletin, Number 31, January 1953 - page 58.
THE COUNTERSIGNS
What said John Paul Jones on the brave Bon Homme Richard; What said that good fighting man, lashed foe to foe? You bid me surrender! I've not yet begun to fight! And that was the Navy of long, long ago!
CHORUS And that is the Navy of all Yankee sailormen! From seaboard and inland, from mountains and lakes; The ancient commanders, they gave us the countersigns, We'll steer by the card in their gallant old wakes!
What said Captain Lawrence on board the doomed Chesapeake; What said he when wounded, they bore him down below? "Don't give up the ship!" though the Shannon had beaten him! And that was the Navy of long, long ago!