The Johnstons - The Old Man's Tale

Описание: Poverty and war in England through 2 or 3 generations - from the Boer War to Vietnam (yes)
With an Irish flavour.
Couldn't find this on YouTube so decided to upload, hoping this does infringe property rights.


As sung by The Johnstons (I hope!):


At the turning of the century I was a boy of five,
Me father went to fight the Boers and never came back alive,
Me mother was left to bring us up, no charity she'd seek
So she washed and scrubbed and scraped along on seven and six a week.


When I was twelve I left the school and went to find a job,
With growing kids me ma was glad of the extra couple of bob;
I’m sure that better schooling would have stood me in good stead
But you can’t afford refinements when you’re struggling for your bread.


And when the Great War came along I didn’t hesitate,
I took the royal shilling and went off to do me bit,
I lived in mud and tears and blood, three years or thereabouts
Then I copped some gas in Flanders and got invalided out.


Well when the war was over and we'd settled with the Hun
We got back into civvies and we thought the fighting done,
We'd won the right to live in peace but we didn't have such luck
For soon we found we had to fight for the right to go to work.


In '26 the General Strike it found me out on the streets
Though I'd a wife and kids by then, their needs I had to meet
For a brave new world was coming and a brotherhood of man,
But when the strike was over we were back where we began.


I struggled through the Thirties out of work now and again,
I saw the Blackshirts marching, and the things they did in Spain
So I reared me children decent, and I taught them wrong from right
But Hitler was the rat who came and taught them how to fight.


Me daughter writes me once a month, a cheerful little note
About the colour telly and the other things they’ve got.
She's got a son, a likely lad, he's nearly twenty-one,
But she tells me now they’ve called him up to fight in Vietnam.


We’re living on the pension now, it doesn't go too far;
Not much to show for a life that seems like one long bloody war.
When you think of all the wasted lives it makes you want to cry,
I’m not sure how to change things, but by Christ we’ll have to try.