Lyr Req: The Battle of Blenheim (Robert Southey)

Subject: Lyr Add: THE BATTLE OF BLENHEIM (Robert Southey)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 17 Nov 07 - 10:49 PM

From "The Poetical Works of Robert Southey, Esq.", 1823.

THE BATTLE OF BLENHEIM.

IT was a summer evening,
Old Kaspar's work was done,
And he before his cottage door
Was sitting in the sun,
And by him sported on the green
His little grandchild Wilhelmine.

She saw her brother Peterkin
Roll something large and round,
Which he beside the rivulet
In playing there had found;
He came to ask what he had found,
That was so large, and smooth, and round.

Old Kaspar took it from the boy,
Who stood expectant by;
And then the old man shook his head,
And with a natural sigh,
"'Tis some poor fellow's scull," said he,
"Who fell in the great victory.

"I find them in the garden,
For there's many here about;
And often when I go to plough,
The ploughshare turns them out!
For many thousand men," said he,
"Were slain in that great victory."

"Now tell us what 'twas all about,"
Young Peterkin, he cries;
And little Wilhelmine looks up
With wonder-waiting eyes;
"Now tell us all about the war,
And what they kill'd each other for."

"It was the English," Kaspar cried,
"Who put the French to rout;
But what they kill'd each other for,
I could not well make out.
But every body said," quoth he,
"That 'twas a famous victory.

"My father lived at Blenheim then,
Yon little stream hard by;
They burnt his dwelling to the ground,
And he was forced to fly;
So with his wife and child he fled,
Nor had he where to rest his head.

"With fire and sword the country round
Was wasted far and wide,
And many a childing mother then,
And new-born baby died.
But things like that, you know, must be
At every famous victory.

"They say it was a shocking sight
After the field was won;
For many thousand bodies here
Lay rotting in the sun;
But things like that, you know, must be
After a famous victory.

"Great praise the Duke of Marlbro' won,
And our good Prince Eugene."
"Why 'twas a very wicked thing!"
Said little Wilhelmine.
"Nay .. nay .. my little girl," quoth he,
"It was a famous victory.

"And every body praised the Duke
Who this great fight did win."
"But what good came of it at last?"
Quoth little Peterkin.
"Why that I cannot tell," said he,
"But 'twas a famous victory."

1798.

Subject: RE: Southey's 'Battle of Blenheim' - A Song?
From:
Date: 23 Oct 07 - 01:17 PM

They discussed this as a song in rec.music.org some time ago. Have a look at the various threads linked there.

Subject: Southey's 'Battle of Blenheim' - A Song?
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 23 Oct 07 - 01:14 PM

Back a million years ago (1969) my then not quite husband (now ex) sang a version of Robert Southey's poem, "The Battle of Blenheim".

All I remember of the tune was what went with "It was a famous viiiiic-tory."

It strikes me that a song about the uselessness of war is as appropriate now as it was in the Vietnam era. Probably more so.

Has anybody else heard this poem as a song?

I'd really like to sing it, but haven't enough information in my mental database.

Here's what Historic Poems and Ballads (Ed. Rupert S. Holland. Philadelphia: George W. Jacobs & Co., 1912) has said about the poem:

"Southey's poem tells how a little girl found a skull near the battle-field many years afterward, and asked her grandfather how it came there. He told her that a great battle had been fought there, and many of the leaders had won great renown. But he could not tell her why it was fought or what good came of it. He only knew that it was a "great victory." That was the moral of so many of the wars that devastated Europe for centuries. The kings fought for more power and glory; and the peasants fled from burning homes, and the soldiers fell on the fields. The poem gives an idea of the real value to men of such famous victories as that of Blenheim."

Thanks!

Linn