Lyr Req: Break the News to Mother (Chas. K Harris)

Subject: Break the News to Mother
From:
Date: 08 Jun 98 - 05:06 PM

Need lyrics or any knowledge if a song existed. Understand it is from the Civil War times.

Thanks, Dick Warren

Subject: RE: Break the News to Mother
From: PKD on Teesside
Date: 09 Jun 98 - 02:32 AM

Dick,

There is a music-hall song with a chorus that goes:

Just break the news to mother
You know how dear I love her
And tell her not to wait for me
For I'm not coming home
Just tell her that no other
Can take the place of mother
And kiss those two fond lips for me
Just break the news to her

It may be civil war (I had always assumed it to be WW1).

Fred Jordan from Shropshire sings it. It is one of those songs with a very different tune to the verse & chorus. It's about a young soldier saving the flag & being killed & the colonel coming up & finding that the lad is his son who has run away to enlist.

If this is the one you mean, then reply on this thread & I'll dig you the words out.
Cheers

Paul

Subject: Lyr Add: BREAK THE NEWS TO MOTHER (Chas. K Harris)
From: PKD on Teesside
Date: 09 Jun 98 - 02:48 PM

Assuming I have the right song, this is it

BREAK THE NEWS TO MOTHER
(Charles K. Harris, 1897)

While the shot and shell were screaming upon the battlefield,
The boys in blue were fighting their noble flag to shield.
Came a cry from their brave captain: "Look, boys! our flag is down.
Who'll volunteer to save it from disgrace?"
"I will," a young voice shouted. "I'll bring it back or die,"
Then sprang into the thickest of the fray,
Saved the flag but gave his young life, all for his country's sake.
They brought him back and softly heard him say:

CHORUS: "Just break the news to mother; she knows how dear I love her,
And tell her not to weep for me, for I'm not coming home.
Just say there is no other can take the place of mother,
Then kiss her dear, sweet lips for me, and break the news to her."

From afar a noted general had witnessed this brave deed.
"Who saved our flag? Speak up, lads; ‘twas noble, brave, indeed!"
"There he lies, sir," said the captain. "hHe's sinking very fast,"
Then slowly turned away to hide a tear.
The general in a moment knelt down beside the boy,
Then gave a cry that touch'd all hearts that day.
"It's my son, my brave young hero; I thought you safe at home."
"Forgive me, father, for I ran away." CHORUS

Cheers

Paul

Subject: RE: Break the News to Mother
From: Joe Offer
Date: 09 Jun 98 - 03:18 PM

Gosh, Paul, that's a real tear-jerker. I liked it. I hope you don't mind, but I added line breaks and indents to make it look like what you pasted into the message-posting box. The code for line breaks is < BR > - that's [br], but in angle brackets, with no spaces.
You can indent a paragraph by beginning it with < blockquote> and ending it with < /blockquote>.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Break the News to Mother
From:
Date: 10 Jun 98 - 07:06 PM

Thanks to you all. My Dad used to sing it and I really did not know if the song actually existed!

Dick Warren

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Break the News to Mother
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 09 Apr 04 - 01:12 AM

The Virtual Gramophone has 5 recordings of this song dated between 1902 and 1918.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Break the News to Mother
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 09 Apr 04 - 02:56 AM

Arnold Keith Storm of Mooresville, Indiana, recorded a midwestern folk processed version that he had learned from his father. It's on Folk-Legacy's CD-18, titled "Take the News to Mother (and Other Songs of a More Sentimental Age)."
    Sandy

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Break the News to Mother
From: GUEST,Jim Ward
Date: 09 Apr 04 - 11:22 AM

This song was written by Chas. K. Harris, who was known as "The king of the tear-jerkers". Interestingly, he originally wrote it about a fireman killed in a fire, but in 1897 at the time of the Spanish- American war he re-wrote it as a battle song. A couple of years later it became a big hit in Britain at the time of the Boar War.
Harris was better known for writing "After The Ball"

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Break the News to Mother
From: masato sakurai
Date: 09 Apr 04 - 01:11 PM

Sheet music is at Historic American Sheet Music:

BREAK THE NEWS TO MOTHER
By Chas. K. (Charles Kassell) Harris
(Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Chas. K. Harris, 1897)

Subject: Lyr Req: Break the News to Mother (Chas. K Harris)
From: keberoxu
Date: 09 Feb 16 - 01:38 PM

Thanks for setting me straight; for no reason that I can recall, for years I have believed this to be a Stephen Foster tune....maybe from seeing it in an anthology someplace. The author of "After the Ball" -- now, that has far better sense.