Songs of the soldiers

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November 18, 2007

Songs of the soldiers

Confederate tunes share stories about homesickness, war

Misty Watson The Dalton Daily Citizen Sun Nov 18, 2007, 11:06 PM EST

Tim Coker played the familiar tune “Yankee Doodle” on his guitar, but he didn’t sing the same lyrics you might remember.

Instead of “put a feather in his hat and called it macaroni,” out came the words “put a musket in my hand and showed me how to fire it.”

The song, “Valiant Conscript,” described a man forced to fight for the Confederacy in the Civil War. When first made to enlist the man thought he could become a general, but the song takes a humorous twist when he ends up being a coward, Coker explained on Sunday afternoon at the Whitfield-Murray Historical Society meeting at the Crown Garden and Archives.

Coker, a Murray County native, learned the songs popular in the Civil War era and those written by Confederate soldiers as a war re-enactor. He re-enacted for 10 years before quitting five years ago.

Re-enactors “would sit around and sing these songs and I thought I wanted to learn them too,” Coker said. So he began singing the tunes, but no one had a guitar. He bought one and learned how to play the songs that were important to soldiers during the Civil War.

Many times soldiers “took the melodies already popular and used them to tell their stories,” said Civil War enthusiast Marvin Sowder. “If you’re in camp, boredom is a big thing.”

Civil War soldiers fought an average of 10 days a year, Coker said. So making up new lyrics to songs was a way for them to pass the time.

Many camps formed glee clubs and traveled to other companies to perform, Sowder said.

Because many songs from the Civil War era told soldier’s stories, they were comprised of six to eight verses and some had more than that, Coker said.

“‘Rebel Soldier’ is a sadder song about a man who misses home,” he said. “The narrator recalls everyone he left behind. One line states ‘I left my dear old mother to weep and mourn.’”

Another song expressed the fear and sadness soldiers encountered with the lines “some are dead and some are dying and many are in tears” and “dying tonight, dying tonight, dying on the old campground.”

“Vacant Chair” brought tears to several people’s eyes when Coker sang it. The lyrics describe a man who was killed carrying a battle flag, one of the most honored positions for a soldier, Coker said.

“When (the Yankees) saw someone carrying one of the banners, they shot at them first,” Coker explained. “The banner carriers were the bravest of the brave.”

The 39th Georgia battle flag is full of holes from being shot so many times, Sowder said.

But not all the songs from the Civil War era are sad.

One of Coker’s favorites, “Rose of Alabamy” is an upbeat song he played on the banjo.

The song “Goober Peas” tells of people eating peanuts during the war. The lyrics state “the Georgia militia eating goober peas.”

Marcelle White chimed in that some of her “family would have starved to death had it not been for goober peas.”

Coker says he doesn’t know “much about the history of these songs. I just sing them.” He claims to not be a guitar or banjo player either.

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Songs of the soldiers

Confederate tunes share stories about homesickness, war

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