Hold the Fort

DESCRIPTION: "Ho, my comrades, see the signal, Waving in the sky; Reinforcements now appearing, Victory is nigh. 'Hold the Fort, for I am coming,' Jesus signals still...." The "great Commander" will defeat Satan's "mighty host."
AUTHOR: Philip P. Bliss (1838-1876)
EARLIEST DATE: 1870 (sheet music published by S. Brainard's Sons, according to Silber-SongsOfTheCivilWar; it appeared in Bliss's collection _The Charm_ in 1871, according to Julian)
KEYWORDS: religious battle nonballad
FOUND IN: US
REFERENCES (4 citations):
Silber-SongsOfTheCivilWar, pp. 358-359, "Hold the Fort" (1 text, 1 tune)
Silber-SoldierSongsAndHomeFrontBalladsOfCivilWar, pp. 82-83, "Hold the Fort" (1 text, 1 tune)
Silber/Silber-FolksingersWordbook, p. 363, "Hold the Fort" (1 text)
DT, HOLDFRT2*
Roud #42793
RECORDINGS:
Chautauqua Preachers' Quartette, "Hold The Fort" (Columbia A1585, 1914)
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Hold the Fort (Union Version)"
SAME TUNE:
Hold the Fort (Union Version) (File: PSAFB020)
Hold the Fort for Balfour's Coming (File: KSUC187A)
Storm the Fort, Ye Knights (Knights of Labor song: "Toiling millions now are waking, See them marching on") (Foner, p. 154; Darling-NewAmericanSongster, pp. 371-372)
Storm the Fort ("Oh, my brothers, see the children, Crying in the street") (Foner, p. 269)
Our Battle Song ("Hark! the bugle note is sounding Over all the land") (Foner, p. 269)
Columbia's Daughters (by Harriet H. Robinson; Darling-NewAmericanSongster, p. 358)
The Bromsgrove Nailers (Jon Raven, _VIctoria's Inferno: Songs of the Old Mills, Mines, Manufacturies, Canals, and Railways_, Roadside Press, 1978, pp. 164-165)
Workman's Hymn ("Look comrades, see the signal Waving in the sky") (by Alfred Green) (Foner, p. 130)
Cooper Campaign Song ("Listen comrades! sore beleaguered, In the toils we lie") (by Mrs. S. M. Smith) (Foner, p. 136)
Poll Your Vote ("Greenback voters, take fresh courage, Rouse and lead the way") (Foner, p. 136)
Spread the Light ("Fellow-toilers, pass the watchword! Would you know your powers?") (Foner, p. 166)
An Eight Hour Song ("Ho! my brothers! See the danger, Gath'ring fast and dread") (Foner, p. 225)
Henry George Campaign Song ("Ho! ye workmen, see the campaign Now is raging high") (FOner, p. 262)
Campaign Song [1887] ("Say, boys, did you hear the thunder? Look out for a storm") (by J. W. Jackson) (Foner, p. 265)
[Socialist parody by W. B. Creech] ("Ho! our comrades, see our emblem, Waving in the sky!") (Foner, p. 297)
Our Cause ("Dedicated to Socialistic Comrades") ("Comraes, up! up! and be doing For our cause so just and grand") (Foner, p. 299)
Round Our Banner ("Round our banner let us rally Hearts on fire with zeal") (Garfield and Arthur Campaign Song Book 1880, p. 7)
Hurrah for General Garfield ("Patriots, to the standard rall Of the true and just") (Garfield and Arthur Campaign Song Book 1880, p.11)
Victory Is Sure ("Rally round the flat again! The flag that Union bore!") (Garfield and Arthur Campaign Song Book 1880, p. 15)
NOTES [712 words]: Inspired by, though hardly based on, a Civil War event (with a text perhaps suggested in part by Isaiah 13:2). After Atlanta had fallen to the Union, General Sherman set up a supply dump at Allatoona. General John Bell Hood, the Confederate commander who had lost Atlanta, decided to attack Sherman's communications. A Confederate force under General French attacked the base at Allatoona on October 5, 1864, and called upon Union General Corse to surrender. Soon after, General Sherman was said to have sent a simple message to Corse: "Hold the fort; I am coming." Corse held out, and Sherman's troops arrived in time to drive off French.
The battle itself was minor; Woodworth, p. 585, devotes only a paragraph to it, saying, "On October 5, major elements of Hood's army struck a Union garrison of slightly fewer than 2,000 men under the command of John Corse at Allatoona Pass. Corse's little band of Army of Tennessee troops.... succeeded in beating off a daylong series of assaults by several times their numbers of Confederates, inflicting ruinous casualties on the attackers. The approach of Sherman's main force finally compelled the Rebels to break off their efforts and withdraw." In total, there were just eight Union regiments of infantry and a battery of artillery involved (Phisterer, p. 194), from Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois.
But, as Boatner says on p. 8, the action was "best known for a number of dramatic incidents associated with it."
The garrison was originally smaller, according to Boatner, p. 8 -- 860 men under Lt. Colonel John F. Tourtellote of the Fourth Minnesota regiment. (Harpers, p. 671, gives the slightly higher total of 890 and says that they were "well protected by redoubts"). Brigadier General Corse was ordered to bring up about a thousand reinforcements when it appeared Hood's forces were on the prowl. French, upon arriving before the garrison and their fort, sent in a request for the Federals to surrender "to avoid a needless effusion of blood," to which Corse answered, "we are prepared for the 'needless effusion of blood' whenever it is agreeable to you."
The initial fighting took place outside the entrenchments, but Corse's men were forced back to their defenses early in the conflict. They had inflicted enough casualties, however, that French paused, allowing Corse to put his men in strong positions (Harpers, p. 682)
The Federals had a system of signal flags, and General Sherman sent multiple messages. One of them read "Sherman is coming. Hold out." A sloppy journalist reported this as "Hold the fort; I am coming," and composer Bliss took it from there.
Many of General Corse's men suffered; 707 out of 1944 were casualties. The Rebels reportedly lost 799 (Boatner, p. 9). Corse himself was wounded in the face, and was unconscious for a time as a result (Boatner, p. 9), but he managed a day later to get off another of his dramatic messages: "I am short a cheek-bone and an ear, but am able to whip all hell yet" (Harpers, p. 672 n. 1).
Sherman supposedly said that the signal corps, which had passed the messages between Corse and the main army, had done such good work in the campaign that it more than paid its entire expence from the time of its origination (Harpers, p. 672)
Corse's skill with words had its rewards. Corse, a brigadier general with limited experience, was breveted major general to date from the day of the conflict (Phisterer, p. 257), while Lt. Colonel Tourtellotte (whose troops had broken up one of the Confederate assaults, according to Harpers, p. 671) was made Colonel to date from that day (Carley, p. 148).
The event did have some deeper significance: It caused Sherman to realize that he was going to have problems with supplies as long as he was based in Atlanta and Hood was prowling around the railroad from Tennessee. It was this problem, according to Grant, p. 356, which inspired Sherman to plan and implement his famous "March to the Sea."
Philip P. Bliss, when he published this song in his 1871 collection The Charm, apparently used the tune name "Faithfulness" (Julian, p. 150). For more on Bliss, see the notes to "Let the Lower Lights Be Burning." Julian, p. 1613, also suggests seeing p. 105 of Ira D. Sankey's My Life for information on this song. - RBW
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File: SCW82

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