The Shipyard Apprentice

[INTRO:] C

[VERSE 1:]

G     C                       G
I was born in the shadow of a Fairfield crane
        Dm         F           C
And the blast of a freighter's horn
        G          F          C
Was the very first sound that reached my ears
       Dm      F     G
On the morning I was born
                               Dm
As I lay and I listened to the shipyard sounds
       F      G     C
Coming out of the unknown
      G         F          C
I was lulled to sleep by a mother tongue
     Dm     F     G
That was to be my own


[VERSE 2:]

  C              G
Before I grew to one year old
  Dm        F      C
I heard the sirens scream
     G    F              C
As a city watched in the blacked-out night
  Dm        F           G
A wandering searchlight beam
                    Dm
And then one day I awoke and rose
   F        G      C
To my first day of peace
      G                F         C
And I learned that the battle to stay alive
    Dm    F        G
Was never going to cease

[VERSE 3:]

      C                      G
And I sat in the school from nine to four
      Dm             F        C
And I dreamed of the world outside
          G        F       C
Where the riveters and the platers watch
      Dm         F      G
Their ships slip to the Clyde
                            Dm
Where the girls are placing stone on stone
        F         G          C
And can watch his Labourer's Row
   G         F       C
My time will come to walk with them
       Dm     F       G
In the land I love to know


[VERSE 4:]

    C                      G
And then one day when they set me free
        Dm      F      C
I'll be walking like a man
       G      F        C
Wi' my purses weighted in my boots
       Dm     F        G
In the shadow o'er the clan
                                Dm
And the oil and the grease will stain my skin
   F    G     C
Forever on my hands
  G      F              C
A living sign that I've been set free
     Dm     F      G
That I've become a man

• C
• Dm
• F
• G