Lay That Luger Down

DESCRIPTION: "Sluggin' Jerry left and right, Havin' lots of fun, Till one night we caught him right, Now he's on the run. Oh, lay that Luger down, kid, lay that Luger down, Luger-luggin' Ludwig, lay...." The singer says why the German should surrender
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1979 (Hopkins-SongsFromTheFrontAndRear)
KEYWORDS: war warning humorous derivative
FOUND IN: Canada
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Hopkins-SongsFromTheFrontAndRear, p. 17, "Lay That Luger Down" (1 text, tune referenced)
Roud #24981
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Pistol Packin' Mama" (tune)
NOTES [145 words]: Elizabeth-Anne Wheal and Stephen Pope, The Macmillan Dictionary of The Second World War, second edition, Macmillan, 1997, p. 369, says that "The most famous types [of pistols issued to officers] were the American Browning Colt 0.45 inch, and the German 9mm Luger, although the latter had been superseded as standard issue from 1938 by the 9mm Walther P38." But no doubt some officers kept their old sidearms. In any case, it was a common German model of pistol.
Hopkins-SongsFromTheFrontAndRear thinks the song was written after the capture of the Falais Gap in 1944, and the reference to the Normandy Campaign does indeed assure a 1944 date, but it's worth remembering that there were two invasions of France (in Normandy and in the Mediterranean), and the song fits both; the reference to Normandy doesn't mean that only the invaders of Normandy could sing it. - RBW
Last updated in version 5.0
File: Hopk017B

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