THE POOR SOLDIER!

A Popular Camp-fire Song of the 62d Alabama Regiment (The Boy Regiment.)

Little do rich people know,
What we poor soldiers undergo—
Called upon to take up arms,
To guard our country from all harm.
Break of day—the morning gun,
Wakes the rebels—the fife and drum,
Breaks a soldier’s sweet repose—
He tumbles out—puts on his clothes.
First sergeant rushes in and out:
“Hurrah! hurrah, boys! do turn out;”
Front and rear he forms his line—
His ’coutrements and sword must shine.
“Eyes right!—steady!” is the word;
Our captain then presents his sword—
The sergeant jerks out his roll—
Names are called—the absent told.

Our surgeon is a man of skill,
Gives the sick each day bread pills;
If his pills do not act well—
He swears and damns our souls to hell.
Would you know who wrote this song,
I will tell—it won’t take long;
It was composed by A. T. Height,
While walking post one rainy night.

THE BONNIE WHITE FLAG;

OR, THE PRISONER’S INVOCATION TO PEACE.

Col. W. S. Hawkins. In Camp Chase Ventilator, 1864.

Air—“Bonnie Blue Flag.”

Though we’re a band of prisoners,
Let each be firm and true,
For noble souls and hearts of oak,
The foe can ne’er subdue.
We then will turn us homeward,
To those we love so dear;
For peace and happiness, my boys,
Oh, give a hearty cheer!
Chorus.—Hurrah! Hurrah! for peace
And home, hurrah!
Hurrah for the Bonnie White Flag,
That ends this cruel war!

The sword into the scabbard,
The musket on the wall,
The cannon from its blazing throat,
No more shall hurl the ball;
From wives and babes and sweethearts,
No longer will we roam,
For ev’ry gallant soldier boy,
Shall seek his cherished home.
Chorus.
Our battle banners furled away,
No more shall greet the eye,
Nor beat of angry drums be heard,
Nor bugle’s hostile cry.
The blade no more be raised aloft,
In conflict fierce and wild.
The bomb shall roll across the sward,
The plaything of a child.
Chorus.
No pale-faced captive then shall stand,
Behind his rusted bars,
Nor from the prison window bleak,
Look sadly to the stars;
But out amid the woodland’s green,
On bounding steed he’ll be,
And proudly from his heart shall rise,
The anthem of the free.
Chorus.
The plow into the furrow then,
The fields shall wave with grain,
And smiling children to their schools,
All gladly go again.
The church invites its grateful throng,
And man’s rude striving cease,
While all across our noble land,
Shall glow the light of Peace.
Chorus.