Battle Hymn of the Republic

From "John Brown's Body lies a-mouldering in the grave" to "Let's Hang Jeff Davis from a Sour Apple Tree," this tune had many different lyrics, but Julia Ward Howe wrote what became the standard lyrics that are so well- known today. This may be the most famous and liked song of the era (though I suppose that "Dixie" likely challenges it in the fame department.) I find it impossible not to sing along, especially the chorus, whether it is sung at a fast pace, a slow, dramatic speed or somewhere in between. There are many arrangements of this fine song.


I reprint the lyrics as listed at http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/b/h/bhymnotr.htm

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword;
His truth is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! His truth is marching on.

I have seen Him in the watch fires of a hundred circling camps
They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps;
His day is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! His day is marching on.

I have read a fiery Gospel writ in burnished rows of steel;
“As ye deal with My contemners, so with you My grace shall deal”;
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with His heel,
Since God is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Since God is marching on.

He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment seat;
Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him! be jubilant, my feet;
Our God is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Our God is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me:
As He died to make men holy, let us live to make men free;
[originally …let us die to make men free]
While God is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! While God is marching on.

He is coming like the glory of the morning on the wave,
He is wisdom to the mighty, He is honor to the brave;
So the world shall be His footstool, and the soul of wrong His slave,
Our God is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Our God is marching on.

All Quiet Along the Potomac Tonight

I really like his song, even though I confess to knowing the words only to the first verse. It's still quite a strong message. I also must say I have seen several articles in old newspapers that do include long lists of  names of soldiers, not just officers, injured or killed in various battles. I have no doubt that generals and other officers received much more attention than the common soldiers, but I wonder if the first verse exaggerates that tendency a bit.

The recording of this performance is courtesy of YouTube.

Also, here are lyrics from http://freepages.music.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~edgmon/cwallquiet.htm. They may not be exactly as in the arrangement as sung in the recording (for instance the first line ends "they say" but the version above says "tonight") but the point of the song still comes through rather clearly.


All quiet along the Potomac, they say,
Except now and then a stray picket
Is shot as he walks on his beat to and fro,
By a rifleman hid in the thicket.
'Tis nothing, a private or two now and then
Will not count in the news of the battle;
Not an officer lost, only one of the men,
Moaning out all alone the death rattle.
"All quiet along the Potomac tonight!"

All quiet along the Potomac tonight,
where the soldiers lie peacefully dreaming,
and their tents in the rays of the clear autumn moon,
and the light of the camp fires are gleaming;
there's only the sound of the lone sentry's tread,
as he tramps for the rock to the fountain,
and thinks of the two on the low trundle bed,
far away in the cot on the mountain.
"All quiet along the Potomac tonight!"

His musket falls slack - his face dark and grim,
grows gentle with memories tender,
as he mutters a pray'r for the children asleep,
and their Mother - "may heaven defend her!"
The moon seems to shine as brightly as then -
that night when a love yet unspoken
leap'd up to his lips and when low murmur'd vows
were pledg'd to be ever unbroken.
"All quiet along the Potomac tonight!"

Then drawing his sleeve roughly over his eye
He dashes off tears that are welling,
And gathers his gun closer up to its place
As if to keep down the heart-swelling.
He passes the fountain, the blasted pine tree
The footstep is lagging and weary;
Yet onward he goes, through the broad belt of light,
Toward the shades of the forest so dreary.
"All quiet along the Potomac tonight!"

Hark! Was it the night wind that rustled the leaves,
Was it moonlight so wondrously flashing?
It looks like a rifle -- "Ah! Mary, good-bye!"
And the lifeblood is ebbing and splashing.
All quiet along the Potomac tonight,
No sound save the rush of the river;
While soft falls the dew on the face of the dead -
The picket's off duty forever.
"All quiet along the Potomac tonight!"

A Couple More Thoughts on Lincoln

Another scene I really enjoyed but did not think to mention yesterday was the sinning of Battle Cry of Freedom after the successful vote for the amendment. That is perhaps my favorite song of the Civil War era, or t least at the top of any lust of my favorites, and I thought that scene was very fun and a great addition to the film.

I am not enough of a film buff to try to judge the performances of the various cities and actresses, though I did get the feeling I was in Washingon in 1865 while watching these events, so that must be a compliment to their performances, but I confess that almost every time Thaddeus Stvens spoke or pleased on-screen, I knew it was Tommy Lee Jones. Perhaps that is because I am more familiar with him than with the others, but his voice as Stevens sounded to me like his voice from Men in Black. I do not know why I heard it like that and I thought Stevens was a powerful character in the film and very believable, but for some reason I just heard Jones' voice whenever he spoke and even saw Jones' face, though the wig did look like what I had imagined it to be on Stevens' head. I just knew that was Tommy Lee Jones whenever Stevens was on camera, but did not get the same feeling for the other characters.

Here is one good version of  Battle Cry of Freedom (not from the film) courtesy of YouTube. Perhaps I will try to find videos for a opulent mor of my favorite Civil War era songs and share them here too.

Lincoln: The Movie

I finally found time to see Steven Spielberg's film Lincoln today and though I am not trying to do a full review of it (there are plenty already available since it has been out 2 months) I wanted to write a few words while it is still fresh in my mind.

First of all, this is probably now my favorite movie of all time. Silence of the Lambs was probably my previous favorite, but this really does not mean much since I see so few movies. (My last trip to the theater was for Star Trek: Nemesis a long time ago.) Still, my impression of this movie was that it is simply sensational.

A couple of scenes actually hit me kind of hard emotionally. One was early in the movie when the president got on the floor to wake up Tad and then picked him up on  his back to go to bed. The other was when Lincoln was reading to his son while waiting for the results of the vote on the 13th Amendment. I don't know the reasons, but both of those really struck me as being great scenes and images.

Another one was when he was leaving to go to Ford's Theater with Mary. Of course, I know the historical record and what happened next, but to be emotionally involved in the movie and then get to that point - well, it really got to me, just imagining the pain of the next few hours for so many people.

I am not going to pick nits over any issues of the film. I thought a couple of scenes toward the end were a bit contrived or maybe could have been done better. Would it have been better to show the events at Ford's Theater? Or, maybe they could have ended the flick with Lincoln walking down the White House hallway, heading towards his ride to the theater, leaving the rest up to the viewer's imagination. Then again, who am I to criticize Spielberg, especially for a film I loved so much.

I also must admit that being away from the theater for so long made me forget how spectacular the big screen can be. That is so different from my normal TV, Ipad or computer screens, but I had not thought about that before today. That added to how impressed I was with this show.

I really liked how it addressed some of the subtle items of Lincoln's life and challenges he faced, stuff that non-history buffs might not know, such as the relationship with his son Robert, with Mary, with cabinet members, the politicking to get votes and the different views of Republicans, conservative and radical.

Overall, it was just an enjoyable movie, with a lot of historical information in it, presented in a way that people who might not watch a documentary may enjoy and learn from. I just had a wonderful time watching it and kind of wish somebody would do a similar film and call it "Mary Todd" about her years in the White House and then afterwards with all the challenges she faced. I guess there would not be enough demand for something like that, but I think a similar effort could produce a spectacular (and probably gut-wrenching) story. Maybe it would be too sad to show in such a format, but I would certainly watch it.

1972 Advertising angle

I realize the picture is not the greatest, but this is a bourbon advertisement from 1972. The paragraph on the sides discusses a Perryville re-enactment from October 1964 showing men pretending to be in the battle of October 1862.

The point of the writing is for Barton Distilling Country to promote their current batch of bourbon (from 1972 when the advertisement ran, in Life magazine) having been aged since that re-enactment. They apparently were proud of their 8-year aging process and used this advertising to promote their product.

Of course, the more interesting part of the ad was the language at the very top of the page. First of all, the first reading of it makes it seem as if they had been aging their bourbon for over a century. Then comes their choice to claim "the South trounced the North in the Civil War."

Where they got that from  is a mystery. When I started reading the smaller print about the re-enactment I thought they might use a Confederate "victory" in the staged battle to tie to the large print above but they did not do so.

Apparently, this advertisement was meant to appeal to a certain audience, i.e. those who favored the Southern cause. Barton, or its advertising consultants must have thought that this wording would catch attention and (hopefully) the dollars of southern supporters. Almost forty years later, it certainly caught my attention.

I do note that the term "Confederacy" does not appear in the ad; the only symbol of the Confederacy is a partial view of the Confederate national flag, with no sign of the battle flag. They did use the term "Johnny Reb" in the bottom paragraphs, but no mention of "Confederate" is made - just the term "the South" at the top and "Reb" at the bottom.

I suppose this was just a case of using wording to appeal to a certain group of people, but I am still a bit surprised to see something as blatant as "The year the South trounced the North in the Civil War" given that this phrase was so far from any sort of historical accuracy and that this ad ran in a national magazine.