From: wwarf@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (Wayne J. Warf)
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
Subject: Re: Battle Hymn of the Republic.
Date: 27 Aug 92 17:31:42 GMT
Organization: Indiana University

In article <1992Aug22.161859.7792@bnlux1.bnl.gov> KARLIN@BNLCL6.BNL.GOV (P.L. Cowan) writes:
>I just looked at soc.history for the first time. Boy, do they have a mess!
>I just hope Mutlu doesn't decide he is interested in the American Civil War.
>
>Any way, one post over there raised some questions about the "Battle Hymn of
>the Republic". Since I had a question of my own on the subject, I thought I'd
>transplant it to this news group which is currently less "noisy". I have
>extracted the most informative follow-up posting, which included the original
>question.
>
>In <11756@optilink.UUCP> cramer@optilink.UUCP writes:
>
>: In article <22828@hacgate.SCG.HAC.COM>, meyer@brahma.edsg.hac.com (Mike Meyer) writes:
>: > Can anybody here either fill me in or point me to a reference about the
>: > origin of the song "Battle Hymn of the Republic?"
>: > 
>: > When was it written?  Did it pre-date the civil war?  Was it written as
>: > a propaganda song for the war?   Where was it first published or heard?
>: > 
>: > Who is this Steffe-Howe person, anyway?
>: > 
>: > The song "John Brown's Body" is a variant on the Battle Hymn; which came
>: > first?  Was the melody already around (like "The Star Spangled Banner") or
>: > was it composed?
>: > 
>: > Mike Meyer
>: 
>: The song "John Brown's Body" was written shortly before the war,
>: obviously after John Brown was executed by the state of Virginia.
>: (Hence, the verse, "John Brown's body lies a-moldering in the 
>: grave.")  It was, not surprisingly, popular with extreme 
>: abolitionists, since more moderate elements of the North were
>: not at all pleased with Brown's rash use of force.
>: 
>
>A folk singer (of Civil War tunes) in Harper's Ferry W.Va. told the story that
>the song was adapted from a Methodist Hymn by soldiers in a Mass. regiment.
>He said that the subject was not the famous "John Brown" but a fellow soldier
>of the same name who had died early in the war due to illness. The song
>allegedly caught on for other (obvious) reasons.

From the booklet accompanying a recently purchased CD "Songs of the Civil War"
<Columbia 1991> 

"Volumes were written on the convergence of these two famous, inspirational
songs, both of which share an old Methodist hymn as the source of their
melody, "Say, Brothers Will You Meet Us?"<whence comes the "Glory Hallelujah"
chorus>. As to John Brown, history provides that the matyred abolitionist, 
who failed to ignite a slave revolt with his 1859 raid on Harpers Ferry, 
nevertheless supplied a rallying cry for the Civil War. Not so well known 
is the fact that he shared a name with a Scottish tenor in a Boston based
battalion glee club. It was that company's ribbing of their mate's unfortunate moniker which, in the spring of 1861, evolved into the lyrics for a song
eventually, if wrongly, adopted as a tribute to and an anthem for
Abolitionists.

Segue to November of that year, when Bostonian Julia Ward Howe, an ardent 
Abolitionist, was visiting Union Army camps outside Washington, DC, mingling 
with the soldiers, singing their songs. These included "John Brown's Body"
for which a fiend suggested Ms. Howe might write some special verses. 
Back in her downtown hotel, she woke in the gey dawn with lines swirling
in her mind: "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord,"
they began. She quickly scrawled them on paper and returned to bed. In
January 1862, her verses were in the New York Daily Tribune; a month later,
Atlantic Monthly, paid her four or five dollars for the poem, which was
then printed as sheet music by the Oliver Ditson Co. of Boston. Ms. Howe 
became a major figure in suffragist movement; when she died in 1910 at
age 91, she was buried buried to the strains of her 'Battle Hymn of
the Republic'".

-- 
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 | Wayne J. Warf -- WWARF@ucs.indiana.edu -- I speak for myself only  |
 |"Government is like fire, a dangerous servant and a fearful master" |
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