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The Drummer Boy of Waterloo
A song popular in Great Britain soon after the event to which
it refers, often printed in England as a broadside (e.g., one issued
by Taylor's Song Mart, 93, Brick Lane. Spitalfields). appearing in
this country in such repositories of popular song as The American
Songster and The Forget-Me-Not Songster, and reported as tradi-
tional song from Virginia (FSV 67), West Virginia (FSS 395),
Missouri (OFS i 338), Ohio (BSO 163-4), and Illinois (JAFL
LX 217).
358 NORTH CAROLINA FOLKLORE
'Drummer Boy of Waterloo.' From an anonymous contributor, in a
manuscript described by Dr. White thus : "MS in a hand apparently
of mid- 1 9th century, on old paper, but not that old. No notes of any sort.
From an old song collection? Together with a typescript on thin paper
and blue carbon characteristic of group of songs typed for publication
by F.C.B. about 1916-18." The text corresponds closely to that of the
Forget-Me-Not Songster except that it lacks four lines preceding the
last stanza, and has various minor corruptions. I have followed the
manuscript.
1 When battle rose each warlike band
And Carnage loud his trumpet blew
Young Edwin left his native land
A drummer boy of Waterloo.
2 And when lips his mother pressed
And bid her noble boy adue
With ringing hands and aching breast
Behold a march for Waterloo.
3 He that knew no infant fears
His knapsack over his shoulder threw
And cried : 'Dear mother, dry your tears
Till I return from Waterloo.'
4 He marched and near the set of sun
Behold a force of arms subdue
The flash of death, the murders gun
Has laid him low at Waterloo.
5 They placed his head upon his drum
Beneath the moonlight's mournful hew
When night was still and battle hum
They dug his grave at Waterloo.