Many years have glided by
Since I saw Fromelles
Still I see it each July
Hear the guns! Fromelles!
See duckboard doused with blood!
Heat the five nine’s crunching thud!
See that body in the mud!
Cordite Stinks! Fromelles!
Lightly out of Bac St Maur
We went to Fromelles
Kissed the girl behind the bar
Gaily for Fromelles
Wended down a winding sap
Halt. A murderous thunderclap
The front platoon is off the map
Hell opened at Fromelles.
Gasping ‘neath the parapet
Over boys! Fromelles
Three hundred yards and then we’re
Set Broken ground. Fromelles
Three hundred more. Consolidate
Dig for love and dig for hate
God! The night is growing late
This gutter’s wet. Fromelles.
Passing words along the line
‘We’re anchored here at Fromelles
The Fifteenth is fast, the Eight is fine
We lied at old Fromelles
Steadily digging through the night
We’re filling bags, we’re making it right
Tomorrow sees us sitting tight
What! Cornered at Fromelles.
Bombing at us from both ends
Fritz knew his Fromelles
55th on you depends
The keeping of Fromelles
We’re holding what! Two hundred yards
Both flanks in the air? Pooh, pooh canard
What’s that? Retreat! We’re running hard
Sauve qui peut! Fromelles.
We’re back behind the parapet
Gasping from Fromelles
Many a fellow’s sun has set
Bloody mess Fromelles!
Source:
Snowy to the Somme: A Muddy and Bloody Campaign, 1916-1918
By Timothy J Cook.
Newport, NSW : Big Sky Publishing, 2014