We Beat 'Em on the Marne

DESCRIPTION: When a pacifist starts to speak against war, a soldier tells a different story: "We beat 'em on the Marne, We beat 'em on the Aisne, They gave us hell at Neuve Chapelle But here we are again."
AUTHOR: Gitz Rice? (see NOTES)
EARLIEST DATE: 1931 (Brophy/Partridge-TommiesSongsAndSlang)
KEYWORDS: war nonballad soldier
HISTORICAL REFERENCES:
Sep 6-10, 1914 - Battle of the Marne, in which the French and British beat back the German attempt to encircle Paris (and so caused World War One to change from a battle of maneuver to a marathon of trench warfare)
Sep 13, 1914 - Beginning of the French counter-attack on the Germans, sometimes called the First Battle of the Aisne
Mar 10-13, 1915 - The British attempt an offensive at Neuve Chapelle in Artois, but fail to significantly alter the situation
FOUND IN:
REFERENCES (5 citations):
Brophy/Partridge-TommiesSongsAndSlang, p. 39, "We Beat 'Em" (1 text)
Nettleingham-TommysTunes, #45, "Here We Are Again" (1 short text, 1 tune, with the first lines perhaps from "Here We Are Again" but the final four lines being "We Beat 'Em on the Marne")
Pegler-SoldiersSongsAndSlangoftheGreatWar, p. 360, "We Beat 'Em" (1 text, tune referenced)
Silverman-BalladsAndSongsOfWWI, pp. 132-135, "We Stopped Them At The Marne" (1 text, t 1une)
ADDITIONAL: John Mullen, _The Show Must Go On! Popular Song in Britain during the First World War_, French edition 2012; English edition, Ashgate, 2015, p. 202, "(We beat 'em on the Marne)" (1 excerpt with notes)
Roud #10928
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Coming Through the Rye" (tune) and references there
NOTES [111 words]: Silverman-BalladsAndSongsOfWWI credits this to Gitz Rice, who wrote several other World War I soldier songs. Yet I note that none of the demonstrably traditional versions of the song include anything but the chorus, and generally not all of that. I have little doubt that Rice wrote the verses -- he sneered at pacifists in other songs -- but I suspect that the chorus about beating the Germans at the Marne is a genuinely traditional fragment that Rice adopted. This would also explain the references in the long version to the Americans joining the war, even though the rest of the chorus seems to date from before that. I emphasize that that is just a guess. - RBW
Last updated in version 7.1
File: BrPa039A

Go to the Ballad Search form
Go to the Ballad Index Song List

Go to the Ballad Index Instructions
Go to the Ballad Index Bibliography or Discography