I Wanta Go Home

DESCRIPTION: "I wanta go home, I wanta go home, The bullets they whistle, the cannons they roar. I don't wanta go to the trenches no more. Ship me over the sea, Where the Allemand can't get at me: O, my! I'm too young to die, I wanta go home!"
AUTHOR: parts by Gitz Rice? (see NOTES)
EARLIEST DATE: 1917 (Nettleingham-TommysTunes)
KEYWORDS: soldier homesickness home war
FOUND IN: US Britain
REFERENCES (6 citations):
Shay-BarroomBallads/PiousFriendsDrunkenCompanions, p. 17, "I Wanta Go Home" (1 short text)
Brophy/Partridge-TommiesSongsAndSlang, p. 55, "I Don't Want to Die" (1 text)
Arthur-WhenThisBloodyWarIsOver, p. 72, "I Want to Go Home" (1 text
Kane-SongsAndSayingsOfAnUlsterChildhood, pp. 181-182, "I want to go home" (1 text)
Nettleingham-TommysTunes, #52, "I Want to Go Home" (1 text, 1 tune)
Ward-Jackson/Lucas-AirmansSongBook, p. 231, "I Want to Go Home" (1 short text, 1 tune, updated for the aircraft of World War II)
Roud #9613 and 10547
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Gee, But I Want to Go Home" (theme, some words)
NOTES [91 words]: Arthur-WhenThisBloodyWarIsOver credits this to Gitz Rice and dates in 1915. Sheet music in the John Hopkins library shows that Lieutenant Gitz Rice did write a song "I Want to Go Home," with this approximate chorus -- but the Rice version has verses and a long chorus, whereas the traditional song does not use the Rice verses and instead converts the first part of the chorus into its own verse and has multiple verses of its own. I'd consider the result a different song. In the circumstances, I'm not entirely sure which version came first. - RBW
Last updated in version 6.8
File: SBar017B

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