The Battle Hymn of the Republic
on 07/07/2008 at 04:07 PM
I’d say the version you picked is pretty accurate, though I couldn’t recall having heard the last verse before.
Lots of Civil War era songs are really moving and patriotic. Words meant more in those days.
We are springing to the call
Of our brothers gone before,
Shouting the battle cry of Freedom;
And we’ll fill our vacant ranks
with A million free men more,
Shouting the battle cry of Freedom.you don’t get lyrics like that from Britney and Fiddy Cent.
Indeed, I’m sure he is Peiper.
That doesn’t change the fact that the words were reworked to a more nobler view. I was actually focused on the resulting songs, not John Brown.
Though, to borrow the Left’s lingo: I support the troops, just not how John Brown wants to do it.
I’ve read a couple of books on Harper’s Ferry in the last year. Why John Brown thought he’d have a chance is beyond me. He really never had one. No slaves rose to support him. The fact that he held the arsenal was moot. Nobody showed up to be armed.
It took a war to end slavery. But John Brown, and his sons, were murderous bastards in Kansas long before Harper’s Ferry.
I applaud the goal, but like today, I oppose abortion, but I do not advocate killing the ‘doctors’ who provide abortions. I personally can think of times I would want my wife to have one ... usually if she would die otherwise. My vows are to my wife, not any children.
Now, let us get back to the Battle Hymn of the Republic. If you do what I did, download all the Limewire would let you, you may have come across Joan Baez’s rendition. Awesome!
I posted my favorite as my last 4th of July post. It is the version by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, who Reagan called “the nation’s choir.” I was lucky enough to hear them sing it live at the Tabernacle, with its incredible acoustics. Chills and tingles.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjfA_3gCd4w
And although this is not the Battle Hymn of the Republic, here is a video that I think should be required viewing.
Oh, very well done Sara on that last link. Good old Red.
I think this comment thread is excellent. Thanks guys, for making me go learn up on old John Brown again, and the whole Bloody Kansas and Missouri Compromise thing. It’s been decades.
There was quite a bit of violence going on in the territories over the slavery question, long before the actual war began. Violence, arson, murder, intimidation ... all of it went on on both sides; the larger, somewhat organized conflicts became known as battles. Not a happy place, and not a happy time. And a fairly lawless time too.
Put yourself in that place at that time. How would you act? Would you be another Brown, acting on his principles, or would you be a silent bystander? Somewhere in between maybe? Coming from our world in which slavery is 145 years dead, could you witness it and not be moved to violence? Could you avoid the verbal and physical “argument” that was Kansas and Missouri in this era? How effective an orator would you be after your first speech when you found your livestock dead and your farm burnt down?
You know I’ve grown up in a number of churchs over all the years of my life - and of course been associated with the military for 29 years - I have never, ever read those two (3 & 6) ever before. . .
I heard the Red piece this weekend (Direct TV, music stations - America) - reminds me of the Dukes redition of America, Why I Love Her.
Wardmama, the Burnished rows of steel verse goes all the way back.
Reader Tom M. attended a ceremony commemorating the 100th anniversay of it’s writing when he was a youngster, and he still had the program, which included the original lyrics in Ms. Ward’s own hand. The sixth verse wasn’t there.
Ages ago, back when even I was a kid, “they” changed “die” to “live” as Christopher points out, which diminishes things greatly. So it doesn’t amaze me that some verses got lost, or new ones were invented later, since it was very popular.
