Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave

Subject: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: GUEST,Willem Lindeboom - the Netherlands
Date: 22 Mar 01 - 06:03 PM

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: mousethief
Date: 22 Mar 01 - 06:39 PM

Hi Willem! Welcome to Mudcat! Can you give us a little more to go on? Is that the name of the song, or a line from it, or something else? Do you remember any of it? This will help our song-finders find it better.

Thanks, and again, welcome!

Alex

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: GUEST,Willem Lindeboom
Date: 23 Mar 01 - 06:46 PM

Sorry for not given enough information. I'm lookin' for the lyric 'Searchin' for a soldier's grave'. At the moment Bob Dylan performs this song in his concerts, shared vocals with Larry Campbell. It's written by Johnnie Wrigt, Jim Anglin and Jack Anglin I also want to know what period this song is about

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: Sorcha
Date: 23 Mar 01 - 06:50 PM

Are these the lyrics? click me. I don't know, but I would guess VietNam........anybody know for sure?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: Sorcha
Date: 23 Mar 01 - 06:52 PM

wrong, Sorch. Looks like it was sung by Kitty Wells, which would make 'Nam right out.......

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: Sorcha
Date: 23 Mar 01 - 07:02 PM

It is the same song, andthis site says:
(Written by Johnnie Wright, Jim Anglin and Jack Anglin, bought for $15 by Roy Acuff in 1943. Source: Chris Goldmann via PSB) Could be either WWI or II. US entered WWII in 1941, but it really sounds like the singer is talking about the acres of unmarked graves in Flanders Field, which is WWI..........

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: Stewie
Date: 23 Mar 01 - 08:19 PM

It was on the Blue Sky Boys first collection on Rounder. It has been reissued on CD: Blue Sky Boys 'Same' Rounder CD 0052. I don't have time to do a transciption now, but I am happy to do so later if no one else can oblige.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: GUEST,Mountain Tyme
Date: 23 Mar 01 - 08:29 PM

I've done this song for many years for Vet Memorial concerts. In addition to Kitty Wells, it was also recorded by the Calahan Brothers, Hank Williams, The Stanley Brothers and others more obscure. I think of WW I as well considering the age of some of the folks I've heard doing it.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: Stewie
Date: 23 Mar 01 - 08:37 PM

Sorry, I did not follow Sorcha's first link. The Blue Sky Boys' version is more or less the same except they start with verse then chorus. There is an extra verse:

Beside each cross mark here all around me
I'll kneel down and gladly say a prayer
For all their loved ones back home across the ocean
Whose hearts like mine are buried over here

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: GUEST,Willem Lindeboom
Date: 24 Mar 01 - 11:07 AM

Thank all of you for your information so far The lyric from Sorcha matches pretty good with the lyrics Dylan uses. Dylan often puts small changes to the lyrics he uses. Dylan starts with the verse "You ask me" /chorus /the verse "Beside each crossmark" / chorus Dylan doesn't use the verse "When I come to the spot"

Written before 1943 it's most likely that the song is about WW I. I'm not sure that the Americans fought in Flanders-Belgium but I'll find out about that.

Are the writers of this song Americans ?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: wildlone
Date: 24 Mar 01 - 04:43 PM

Americans fought in WW1, the US government declared war on the Germans in 1917 but Americans volunteered before then.
American volunteers

American Negros in ww1

More
dave

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: GUEST,Willem Lindeboom
Date: 24 Mar 01 - 06:44 PM

I know that America declared war on the Germans, April 6 1917. They landed in Europe June 26. Nowadays called "The First Intervention" I did study history (in fact I still do)and I did visit lots of historical places in Belgium. I can't recall any cemetery with graves of Americans from WW I, like there are in France. Thank for the 3 sites about Americans in WW I.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Searchin' for a soldier's grave
From: Stewie
Date: 24 Mar 01 - 07:17 PM

Willem, the people you mentioned were from Tennessee. It may be difficult, however, to determine exactly who wrote the song. Jim and Jack Anglin worked together as the Anglin Brothers/Twins and did some great gospel stuff in the 1930s - 'Just Inside the Pearly Gates' was a classic. In 1940, Jack Anglin teamed up with his brother-in-law Johnny Wright. As Johnny and Jack and the Tennessee Mountain Boys, they finally had a string of hits in the 1950s - 'Ashes of Love', 'Poison Love' etc. Jack Anglin died in a car accident in 1963 and Johnny Wright combined his show with that of his wife, Kitty Wells.

Bill C. Malone, in his 'Country Music USA' University of Texas Press, Austin, 1985, credits the song to Jim Anglin alone (p 195) and refers to a recording by the Bailes Brothers. The matter of determining song authorship can be difficult because credits often relate to the owner of the piece rather than the composer or arranger. On the Blue Sky Boys album that I referred to above, the credit is to 'Roy Acuff/Acuff-Rose BMI'. As indicated above, Roy Acuff appears to have been the owner. Jim Anglin wrote many of Acuff's best songs such as 'Lonely Mound of Clay', Stuck Up Blues', 'Just a Friend' etc. Jim also wrote 'Ashes of Love' which was a hit for Johnny and Jack.

Make of all that what you will.

--Stewie.

Subject: Lyr Add: SEARCHING FOR A SOLDIER'S GRAVE (Acuff)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 06 Jun 02 - 10:13 PM

Lyrics copied from http://home.nycap.rr.com/coollz03/kitty-searchingfor.htm

SEARCHING FOR A SOLDIER'S GRAVE
(Roy Acuff)

CHO: Somewhere here among these many thousands
Of Americans who all died true and brave,
That's where I know I'll find him resting.
So I'm here. I'm searching for his grave.

You ask me, stranger, why I made this journey.
Why cross three thousand miles of rolling waves?
Like many others, my darling was killed in action.
That's why I'm here. I'm searching for his grave. CHO.

When I come to the spot where he's sleeping,
I know it will cause more heartaches inside.
But I'll long to be by his side once more and tell him,
Tell him that I love him, and will until I die. CHO.

[Recorded by the Louvin Brothers, the Blue Sky Boys, Kitty Wells, and Ralph Stanley. AMG reports that "Acuff" is credited as the writer on all 4 recordings.]

[Here is the web site for the American Battle Monuments Commission]