Here is an anti-war song sent to me from a reader. He says that it was written and sung by the British in protest to that Empire’s wars around the turn of the century. The song was revived for WWI. It then became “Americanized,” and was used to protest the USA being engaged in the WWI.
Below is the British version of the lyrics. I have linked to an American version of the song with slightly different lyrics.
I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
I brought him up to be my pride and joy
Who dares to put a musket on his shoulder
To shoot another mother’s darling boy
Why should he fight in someone else’s quarrels
It’s time to throw the sword and gun away
There would be no war today
If the nations all would say
No I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
To go fighting in some far-off foreign land
He may get killed before he’s any older
For a cause that he will never understand
Why should he fight another rich man’s battle
While they stay at home and while their time away
Let those with most to lose
Fight each other if they choose
For I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
To go fighting heathens round the Horn
If God required to prove that boys are bolder
They’d have uniforms and guns when they were born
Why should we have wars about religion
When Jesus came to teach us not to kill
Do Zulus and Hindoos
Not have the right to choose
For I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
I raised him up to be a gentleman
To find a sweet young girl and love and hold her
Bring me some grandchildren when they can
Why can’t we decide that the Empire
Is just as large as it requires to be
And I’d rather lose it all
Than to see my laddie fall
For I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
I have been soldier in WWII, correct I have been a children soldier, because when I was prisonner, I was 17 years old. After I came home, I heard from this song, but it was quite different, as I remeber it was this:
I never teach my son to be a soldier
or to take a rifle or a gin,
or to lift the rifle on his shoulder,
to fight against another mothers son.
Let all the kings of the empire
fight there battles quite alone,
it wouldnt long a day
and they will also say:
I never teach my son to be a soldier,
With this lyric in my mind, I raise my three boys in that way and they never became a soldier.
I would like, much more people should know it.
Poldi Hagenah
Hello,
Is this the Poldi Hagenah that lived (or lives) in Koelin-Reisiek?
Thanks
Jack