Time: 3/4 Tenor: G Bass: D
Key: G
G C Am
Well, how do you do, Private William Mc-Bride
D G D
Do you mind if I sit here, down by your grave-side
G C
And I'll rest for a while in the warm summer sun
D C G ( )
I've been walking all day; Lord, and I'm nearly done
Am
And I see by your gravestone, you were only nine-teen
D7 G D
When you joined the glorious fallen in nineteen six-teen
G Am
Well I hope you died quick and I hope you died clean
D C G
Or Willie Mc-Bride, was it slow and ob-scene
CHORUS
D C G
Did they beat the drum slowly, did they sound the fife lowly
D C G
Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down
C D
Did the bugles play The Last Post in chorus
G C D G
Did the pipes play The Flowers Of The For-est
G C Am
And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart be-hind
D G D
In some faithful heart is your memory en-shrined
G C
And though you died back in nineteen-six-teen
D C G ( )
To that loyal heart are you always nine-teen
Am
Or are you a stranger without even a name
D7 G D
Enshrined for-ever be-hind a glass pane
G Am
In an old photo-graph, torn and tattered and stained
D C G
And fading to yellow in a brown leather frame
G C Am
The sun's shining now on these green fields of France
D G D
The warm wind blows gently and the red poppies dance
G C
The trenches have vanished, long under the plough
D C G ( )
No gas and no barbed-wire, no guns firing now
Am
But here in this graveyard, it's still No Man's Land
D7 G D
The countless white crosses in mute witness stand
G Am
To man's blind in-difference to his fellow man
D C G
To a whole gener-ation who were butchered and damned
G C Am
And I can't help but wonder now, Willie Mc-Bride
D G D
Do all those who lie here know why they died
G C
Did you really be-lieve them when they told you the cause
D C G ( )
Did you really be-lieve that this war would end wars
Am
Well the suffering, the sorrow, the glory, the shame
D7 G D
The killing, the dying, it was all done in vain
G Am
For Willie Mc-Bride, it's all happened a-gain
D C G
And a-gain and a-gain and a-gain and a-gain
ENDING: CHORUS, THEN REPEAT THE LAST TWO LINES OF THE CHORUS
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