Willie Mcbride

      C                     Am
Well how do you do Private William 
McBride
        G                       F 
Do you mind if I sit here down by 
           C
your graveside,
                             Dm
And rest for a while in the warm 
summer sun
           G                   F  
I've been walking all day, and I'm
         C    C
 nearly done
I can see by your gravestone you 
     Dm
were only nineteen
          G               F       
When you joined the dead heroes of
  C           G    G
 nineteen fifteen
       C                         
And I hope you died quick and I 
Am             Dm
hope you died clean
    G                      F      
Or Willie McBride was it slow and 
    C   C
obscene


[Chorus]
          G                        
Did they beat the drums slowly and 
 F              C
sound the fife lowly?
         G                         
Did the rifles fire o’er you as 
   F           C
they lowered you down?
         F                       
Did the bugles sing the last post 
       G     G
and chorus?
         C               F        
Did the pipes play the flowers of 
     G  C
the forest?


[Verse 2]
     C                     Am
Did you leave a wife or a sweetheart
 behind
    G                         
In some faithful heart is your 
  F          C
memory enshrined
                             Dm
And though you died back in nineteen
 fifteen,
    G                         
In some faithful heart are you 
  F           C    C
forever nineteen?
                              Dm
Or are you a stranger without even a
 name
Continúa después del anuncio
G            F       C           
Enshrined forever behind a glass 
 G    G
pane
      C                      
In an old photograph torn and 
  Am            Dm
tattered and stained
     G                     F  
And fading to yellow in a bound 
            C   C
leather frame


[Chorus]
          G                        
Did they beat the drums slowly and 
 F              C
sound the fife lowly?
         G                         
Did the rifles fire o’er you as 
   F           C
they lowered you down?
         F                       
Did the bugles sing the last post 
       G     G
and chorus?
         C               F        
Did the pipes play the flowers of 
     G  C
the forest?


[Verse 3]
     C                           
The sun’s shining now on these green
Am
 fields of France
     G                             
The warm wind blows gently, and the
  F           C
 red poppies dance
                           Dm
The trenches have vanished under the
 plow
    G                          F  
No gas and no barbed wire, no guns
         C   C
 firing now.
But here in this graveyard it is 
 Dm
still no man's land.
     G                F         C
The countless white crosses in 
             G   G
mute witness stand
    C                          Am 
To man's blind indifference to his
         Dm
 fellow man.
       G                     
To a whole generation who was 
  F             C      C
butchered and damned.


[Chorus]
          G                        
Did they beat the drums slowly and 
 F              C
sound the fife lowly?
         G                         
Did the rifles fire o’er you as 
   F           C
they lowered you down?
         F                       
Did the bugles sing the last post 
       G     G
and chorus?
         C               F        
Did the pipes play the flowers of 
     G  C
the forest?


[Verse 4]
         C                         
Well, I can't help but wonder now, 
 Am
Willie McBride,
   G                        F     
Do all those who lie here know why
       C
 they died?
Did you really believe them when 
     Dm
they told you the cause?
         G                   F
Did you really believe this war 
             C    C
would end wars?
Well, the suffering, the sorrow, the
  Dm
 glory, the shame,
     G            F            C 
The killing, the dying, it was 
           G   G
all done in vain.
     C                      
For Willie McBride, it's all 
 Am         Dm
happened again,
      G                     F     
And again, and again, and again, 
     C   C
and again.


[Chorus]
          G                        
Did they beat the drums slowly and 
 F              C
sound the fife lowly?
         G                         
Did the rifles fire o’er you as 
   F           C
they lowered you down?
         F                       
Did the bugles sing the last post 
       G     G
and chorus?
         C               F        
Did the pipes play the flowers of 
     G  C
the forest?