World War I Song (In the Argonne Forest)

DESCRIPTION: "Listenm I'll tell you now Of days of long ago..." "Of a friend I left behind..." "In the Argonne Forest and bloody ground Where the dead and dying lay, Hermana was a friend of mine" who was killed there. The singer asks God to look down on the dead
AUTHOR: Words: "Banjer" Bill Cornett (source: Roberts/Agey-InThePine)
EARLIEST DATE: 1960 (Roberts/Agey-InThePine)
KEYWORDS: war soldier death derivative | drummer boy World War I Argonne
FOUND IN: US(Ap)
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Roberts/Agey-InThePine #47, "World War I Song" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud #773
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "The Drummer Boy of Shiloh" [Laws A15] (original source)
NOTES [127 words]: Roberts/Agey-InThePine points out the obvious dependence of this song on "The Drummer Boy of Shiloh," and Roud goes so far as to lump them, but this is clearly a rewrite; I consider it a separate song.
The Meuse-Argonne Offensive lasted from the final week of September 1918 until the end of the war. According to the National Archives web site for the battle (https://www.archives.gov/research/military/ww1/meuse-argonne, checked October 30, 1918), over a million American soldiers fought there and 26,000 were killed. One suspects, knowing that the dead man was a Greek called "Hermana" who served in the same unit as Bill Cornett, that the dead man could be identified. But I have not tried to figure it out; the official records seem to be behind a paywall. - RBW
Last updated in version 6.7
File: RAInP118

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