Lyr Req: Menin Gate (Les Sullivan)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Les Sullivan's 'Menin Gate' song
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 08 Sep 02 - 06:44 AM

Looking forward to the CD Les. It must have been yourself I heard sing it at Buntingford but your name did not register in my mind. Also your Jutland song a previous year which I sometimes sing, hope that's OK.
Keith.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Les Sullivan's 'Menin Gate' song
From: GUEST,Les Sullivan
Date: 07 Sep 02 - 03:07 PM

Just back from holiday. Kitty said she had posted this. The verse is quite different from the chorus. If you want it email [e-mail] and I'll give you the phone number and sing it for you over the phone.

Starting work on the CD imminently and appreciate you wanting to do my song.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Les Sullivan's 'Menin Gate' song
From: Dave Bryant
Date: 30 Aug 02 - 09:36 AM

Thanks Kitty.

I'm trying to remember how the tune to the verse goes - is it the same as the Chorus ?

Subject: Lyr Add: MENIN GATE (from Les Sullivan)
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 30 Aug 02 - 08:03 AM

Dave - Les's recording is on hold at the moment, but here you are:

I see you reading names carved in stone
Each one a man with a tale of his own
You came to Ypres with your friends for fun
I came with mine but I carried a gun

Chorus:

I was a sailor, barely nineteen
I fell so far from the sea
They play their bugles each night at eight
For people like me at the old Menin Gate

We joined the navy to fight on the sea
Parfitt and Sawdy, young Dave Tee and me
Funny to think that the one ship we saw
Brought us to Belgium to die in the war

Everywhere water, rain, mud and clay
One great explosion, in water I lay
There in the shell-hole, that's where I drowned
And to this day, well I've never been found

Laugh with your friends as you travel this land
Read our four names, perhaps you'll understand
Out in the fields there's an old shattered tree
And Parfitt and Sawdy, young Dave Tee and me

I'll be seeing him at Wareham later!

Kitty

Subject: Les Sullivan's 'Menin Gate' song
From: Dave Bryant
Date: 30 Aug 02 - 07:37 AM

Does anyone have the words to Les Sullivan's wonderful song about the Sailors who fought in the trenches in WW1. It has a chorus which goes something like:

I was a sailor barely nine(?)teen,
I felt so far from the sea.
They play a bugle each night at eight,
For people like me at the old Menin Gate.

I know Les was going to put it on a record - any news if it has been released yet ?