X:63
T:Green Fields of France, The
R:
song
C:Eric Bogle, Scotland/Australia
D:Stockton's Wing
D:The High Kings
Z:id:hn-song-63
M:3/4
L:1/8
Q:1/4=140
K:G
D2 | D4 DD | G4 GF | E E3 B,2 | A,4
FF | F3 F G2 | A2 B2 A2 | G2 B,2 C2 | D4
D2 | D4 DD | G4 GF | E4 EB, | A,4
FF | F2 F2 G2 | A2 (B2 A2) | G2 G2 A2 | G4
dd | d4 dd | d2 c2 BB | A2 A2 B2 | c4
cc | B2 A2 AB | c2 c2 cA | G2 A2 B2 | A4
dd | d3 d d2 | d2 c2 B2 | B2 A2 G2 | E4
E2 | F F3 G2 | A2 B2 A2 | G2 G2 A2 | G6- | G4
GG | A3 B A2 | A2 B2 cc | c3 d c2 | (BA) G2
GG | A2 A2 A2 | A2 B2 cc | c3 d c2 | A4
AB | c2 c2 c2 | c2 d2 c2 | c2 B4- | B4
AA | G4 AB | c3 B G2 | A3 G F2 | G6- | G4 ||
W:Well, how do you do, private William McBride,
W:Do you mind if I sit here down by your graveside,
W:And rest for a while in the warm summer sun,
W:I've been walking all day and I'm nearly done.
W:
W:I see by your gravestone your were only nineteen
W:When you joined the glorious fallen back in nineteen sixteen
W:Well I hope you died quick and I hope you died clean
W:Or Willy McBride was it slow and obscene?
W:
W:Chorus:
W:Did they beat the drum slowly? Did they sound the fifes lowly?
W:Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down?
W:Did the band play The Last Post in chorus?
W:Did the pipes play The Flowers of the Forest?
W:
W:Did you have a wife or a sweetheart, McBride?
W:In some loyal heart is your memory enshrined,
W:And although you died back in nineteen sixteen,
W:In that loyal heart are you always nineteen?
W:
W:Or are you just a stranger not even a name,
W:Forever to sit behind some glass frame,
W:In an old photograph torn and tattered and stained
W:And fading to yellow in a brown leather frame.
W:
W:Chorus
W:
W:Now the sun it shines bright o'er the green fields of France,
W:And the a warm summer wind makes the red poppies dance,
W:The trenches have vanished long under the plough,
W:There's no gas, no barbed wire, there's no gun firing now.
W:
W:But here in this graveyard it's still no man's land,
W:And countless white crosses in mute witness stand,
W:To man's blind indifference to his fellow man,
W:And a whole generation who were butchered and damned.
W:
W:Chorus
W:
W:Well I can't help but wonder now, Willy McBride,
W:Do all those that lie here know why did they died?
W:Did you really believe them when they told you the cause?
W:Did you really believe that this war would end wars?
W:
W:But the sorrow, the suffering, the glory, the pain,
W:The killing, the dying was all done in vain,
W:For Willy McBride it's all happening again,
W:And again, and again, and again, and again.
W:
W:Chorus