old song for Long War: Here I sit on Buttermilk Hill / Who could blame me cry my fill / Every tear would turn a mill / Johnny has gone for a soldier

"Lullabye"
oil with knives
Joyce Werwie Perry

War drowns and batters us with so many ghastly horrors and tragedies that we are forced to prioritize them, and rarely or never have a moment to notice Horror Number 31 or Tragedy Number 53, we are much too busy with the top of the list, all decent people must marshal our finite and limited energies and resources to respond to the most notorious and most murderous and most unjust and most disgusting tragedies and atrocities and horrors.

This is all part of War's Numbing, war's effect on us like the headlights that stun a deer just ahead in the highway. War's Numbing is like Phobos (Fear) and Deimos (Panic), War's Attendant Godlings, the little orbiting moons of Mars, the God of War.

Tragedy Number 53: War tears lovers apart. When they should be kissing and fucking and embracing all through the Summer, one of them is suddenly sent 10000 miles away, constantly under threat of Death and never returning.

This song is centuries old, so it seems a quaint old museum piece, of no possible interest to us Modern People who are stunned in the headlights of the Iraq War. This song has nothing to do with Iraq, it has nothing to do with us.

For Irish people, it stirs deep echoes; mothers have sung this lullabye to their children in the nursery for centuries. Then, during the American Revolution, so many of the common soldiers were Irish immigrants, an updated version became one of the Revolution's most popular and famous airs.

But for Americans of just a generation ago, it stirs its own echo. A version which got a lot of radio airplay was by the popular folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary, and the airplay was during the Vietnam War, so a lot of Americans of my vintage associate this mournful tune with our young friends who were on fire with young love, and then were torn apart by that senseless, ghastly, foot-shooting, interminable liars' and scoundrels' war. For reasons of national security and global politics, their government tore them apart, sent half of them into Harm's Way, and left the other half home alone to worry and weep, burning joy turned suddenly to bitter cold. Some with a baby growing inside her.

You can read about Vietnam for a month and watch documentaries about Vietnam for a year, but never read or see mention of the hundreds of thousands of lovers ripped from one another's arms, so many (52,000) never again to touch or embrace or see their lover again. (Many lovers come home again, but not Whole.) The ripping was distributed fairly and equally to lovers straight and to lovers gay.

Here we perceive War stripped of its Politics and Foreign Policies and Grand Designs, War without Napoleon or Bush or Rumsfeld or Kissinger or Johnson or McNamara or Nixon, and listen to War from the lips of one lonely, heartbroken girl who just months ago was ablaze in the warm, strong arms of her lover.

She's just a young farm girl, he was just a young farm boy, they shouldn't have been kissing and fucking in the barn to begin with, they certainly should have used a condom, and this all happened so long ago. If the boy had lived through the war, they'd both be dead of old age a long time ago anyway, and the baby, too.

It's not really important. Just ignore it and pay attention to the Important Things about the new war, the things psychopaths and life-despising perverts tell us nightly on Fox News are important about the Iraq War. Why we must Stay The Course, Choose Victory, and Give War A Chance, give the Troop Surge just a little more time -- not September, that's not enough time to determine it's working, November is more realistic. This is a Long War. General David Petraeus, speaking to a BBC reporter in full battle kit, just compared the Iraq War to Britain's Long War against an insurgency in Northern Ireland -- expect a decade of violence and war, a decade of our soldiers coming home in flag-draped coffins, a decade of our neighbors' children maimed for life, before we get our Victory.

You can hear the beautiful, mournful tune as you read the lyrics by right-clicking to open in a new tab. (MIDI sequenced by Dayle K.) It would please me greatly if someone versed in Irish Gaelic would Leave A Comment about the meaning of thu Mavourneen slaun, shule agra, and shule aroon.

* * *

Johnny Has Gone for a Soldier

Here I sit on Buttermilk Hill
Who could blame me cry my fill
Every tear would turn a mill
Johnny's gone for a soldier

Oh my baby, oh my love
Gone the rainbow, gone the dove
Your father was my only love
Johnny has gone for a soldier

Me, oh my, I loved him so
It broke my heart to see him go
And only time will heal my woe
Johnny has gone for a soldier

I sold my flax, I sold my wheel
To buy my love a sword of steel
So it in battle, he may wield
Johnny has gone for a soldier

~ ~ ~

Shule Aroon / Buttermilk Hill / Shule Agra

His hair was black, his eye was blue
His arm was stout, his word was true
I wish in my heart, I was with you
Go thee, thu Mavourneen slaun

Shule, shule, shule agra
Only death can cease my woe
Since the lad of my heart from me did go
Go thee thu Mavourneeen slaun!

I sold my rock, I sold my wheel
When my flax was spun, I sold my wheel
To buy my love a sword of steel
Go thee, thu Mavourneen slaun

I'll dye my petticoat, I'll dye it red
And round the world I'll beg my bread
Till I find my love alive or dead
Go thee, thu Mavourneen slaun

King James was routed in the fray
The Wild Geese went with him away
My boy went too, that dreary day
Go thee, thu Mavourneen slaun

=============

Lesley Nelson-Burns

This is probably an American adaptation of the Irish tune Shule Aroon which dates back to the 17th Century. It is also known as Buttermilk Hill and Shule Agra (the version at this site being a variant). Johnny's Gone For a Soldier was popular during the American Revolutionary War.

I learned this version in the early 70s. It is similar to a version that was done by Peter Paul and Mary. There are variations at:

* Johnny's Gone for a Soldier (1)
* Johnny's Gone for A Soldier (3)
* Sweet William

According to one theory, the tune Shule Agra arose out of the Glorious Revolution of 1688. The Irish supported James II, and were defeated at the [Battle of the] Boyne. William III, who defeated James, offered forgiveness to the rebels who would swear loyalty to him, but many preferred exile. The only evidence for this theory, is that some English versions have the line

But now my love has gone to France
To try his fortune to advance ...

Related Links

* The Contemplator's Short History of Women in the Revolutionary Era
* Women's History in America
* 13 Originals
* Colonial America

* Irish and Jacobite Links
* The Wild Geese
* Wild Geese Heritage Museum and Library
* The Contemplator's Short History of the Jacobite Uprisings

With a short summary of the Uprisings, links to other sites and links to Jacobite Music at this site

* The Battle of the Boyne

Folk Music Pages | Songs by Country
Child Ballads | Songs of the Sea | Turlough O'Carolan

Shule Agra
Download Midi File
Lesley Nelson-Burns
Information

Sule Agra is a 17th century Irish song. The words are similar to those of Shule Aroon. The tunes Johnny's Gone for A Soldier and Sweet William are probably variants of this or Shule Aroon.

The Wild Geese refers to an Irish Brigade (1691-1740) that fought for the Jacobite cause in Ireland and followed James to France to support him there.