The Volunteers

The following data is extracted from Thirteenth Michigan Infantry, February 1909.

Take a green country lad who was raised on a farm,
The first one you come to will do,
Who, far from the city has missed all its harm
And is innocent, honest and true,
Who has followed in spring time the harrow and plow,
In the summer has garnered the grain,
Who has earned what he has by the sweat of his brow
And is browned by the sun and the rain.
Who esteems his own father and mother the best
Of all parents who ever have been,
And believes that his sweetheart in calico dressed
Is the peer of an empress or queen ;
Thinks Washington, Lincoln and Grant were the three
Greatest heroes who lived in the world.
And knows that the Star Spangled flag of the free
Is the proudest flag ever unfurled.
Let him hear that his country has called on its boys
For its honor and fame to do battle;
Let him see the flags flying and hear the sharp noise
Of the fife, and the drum's dizzy rattle
And his cheek with the red flush of courage will glow
And the heart in his bosom beat high,
While the hero unborn will unconsciously show
In his step-in the flash of his eye.
For his forefathers fought for his altars and fires,
And the echoes of Lexington's guns
He can hear, and the spirit bequeathed by the sires
Will tell in the blood of his sons.
Do you think he will hold himself out of the fight
When foemen his country invade?
That America's sons will shrink back in affright
When the nation is calling for aid?
They will spring from the hills and the valleys of Maine,
From the lake-bounded states they will come.
From the South, and the West, from valley and plain
They will gather at beat of the drum.
And the cities will swell the mad tide to a flood,
And roused by America's cries
From the soil that was drenched by their father's best blood
A nation of heroes will rise.
And ne'er shall America's sons bend the knee
To kaisers, to kings, nor to czars,
For our glorious banner forever shall be
With their stripes and their clustering stars
The emblem of freedom on land and on sea,
And Liberty, shorn of their fears
Shall rule where Columbia's flag of the free
Shall be borne by her brave Volunteers.

Mrs. West.

Source: Thirteenth Michigan Infantry, February 1909

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