GO AND SEE REG MEUROSS SUN 9 NOV at the Blue Boar Maldon – playing on Remembrance Sunday with Jess Vincent BOOK HERE or turn up – music from 8pm
Songs from new album England Green & England Grey and songs of remembrance including And Jesus Wept:
And Jesus Wept is Reg’s beautiful and tragic song about WW1 soldier Harry Farr, one of the many soldiers shot for ‘desertion and cowardice’ when he was suffering from shell shock “I got the shakes on Tuesday, I cannot go I said, they sent me down on Wednesday by Thursday I was dead” Harry enlisted in 1914 aged 23 and had fought in the trenches on the Western Front. His position was repeatedly shelled, and in May 1915 he collapsed with strong convulsions. His wife Gertrude recalled that while he was in hospital, “He shook all the time. He couldn’t stand the noise of the guns. We got a letter from him, but it was in a stranger’s handwriting. He could write perfectly well, but couldn’t hold the pen because his hand was shaking.” In spite of this he was sent back to the front and fought in the battle of the Somme. He reported to hospital several times and finally couldn’t take it any more… he was arrested for desertion and court martial. Harry had to defend himself in his own trial and he was sentenced to death and shot at 6am on 18 October 1916.
The moon is slowly sinking, the final moon i’ll see
My head is tired of thinking there’s just the rosary
An empty place at table and my mother’s eyes are wet
The hand of God came down last night
and Jesus wept
If i’d been a captain they would have sent me home
But i am just a private condemned to die alone
The firing squad’s been drinking it’s a dawn they won’t forget
The hand of God came down last night
and Jesus wept
Sound the drum for their young precious years
but no glory will shine on my poor mother’s tears
A soldier’s good for fighting that’s what my father said
And if the man’s not fighting he might as well be dead
Shame has drawn the curtains and the neighbours won’t forget
The hand of God came down last night
and Jesus wept
I got the shakes on Tuesday, I cannot go I said
They sent me down on Wednesday by Thursday I was dead
I fought for king and country 2 years without regret
the hand of God came down last night
and Jesus wept
We all fall in the cause of the free
When the sun sets on England will you think of me?
In unmarked graves in Flanders lie 300 boys and men
Killed un-loved and frightened by those they thought were friends
A nation’s guilty secret is this generation’s debt
The hand of god came down last night
and Jesus wept
