The Rambling Soldier: Life in the Lower Ranks 1750-1900 Through Soldiers' Songs and Writings: Life in the Lower Ranks Through Soldiers' Songs and Writings, 1750-1900 - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0722652941 ISBN 13: 9780722652947

Publisher: Puffin, 1977

Synopsis

Published in 1977 in the UK by Kestrel (Penguin) Books in hardback, this is a detailed 310 page look at 'The Rambling Soldier: Military Life Through Soldiers' Songs and Writings. Life in the Lower Ranks 1750 - 1900'. It's illustrated throughout with drawings, paintings and photos; and has bars of music all the way through recording the soldiers' songs. "If any gentlemen, soldiers or others have a mind to serve Her Majesty, and pull down the French king... let them repair to the noble Sergeant Kite, at the sign of the Raven in this good town of Shrewsbury..." Such patter of the recruiting sergeants could be heard in the market squares of Britain throughout the century and a half (1750 - 1900) covered by this book. Attracted by adventure, of a steady -if small- income and a fine uniform, men flocked to the army in their thousands. There, despite the low pay and the meagre food, these raw recruits were transformed through constant drill and severe punishments into the soldiers that fought in the American War of Independence, in the campaigns against Napoleon, in the Crimea and in numerous small colonial wars. Roy Palmer has brought toegether songs and ballads from the period, and interspersed them with the writings (from letters, memoirs, etc) of many soldiers, as well as contemporary prints, and photographs, to give a vivid account of life in the lower ranks at this time. Extracts are taken from the work of twenty-nine soldier-writers. All served in the ranks, though two became officers. A few - Cobbett, Somerville, Blatchford - later made a living largely by the pen, but most remained obscure. Several are anonymous, and we know of them only from what they have written. Unless much has been lost or remains undiscovred, it seems that few rank and file soldiers of the 18th Century wrote of their experiences. However, the revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars produced a mass of writing, much of it published during the succeeding ten or twenty years

About this title

About the Author

Roy Palmer was educated at Manchester University where he obtained B.A. and M.A. degrees. He taught for many years, the last eleven as head of a Birmingham comprehensive school, before taking early retirement. Involved from the 1960s in singing and seeking traditional songs, his collection of field recordings is now in the Recorded Sound Archive at the British Library. Since the 1970s he has published a number of anthologies of traditional songs and street ballads reflecting different aspects of social, military, maritime, industrial, agricultural and recreational history. In addition he has contributed articles to a variety of periodicals, including English Dance and Song and Folk Music Journal. He has written a number of entries for the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. He has also written a series of books, always with a chapter on song, dealing with the folklore of different counties, the most recent being The Folklore of the Black Country (2007). In 2004 he received an honorary M.A. from the Open University and was awarded a gold badge, its highest honour, by the English Folk Dance and Song Society. He is also a longstanding member of the Folklore Society, and for the last seven years has been chairman of the Friends of the Dymock Poets.

Edition details

• Publisher: Puffin
• Publication date: 1977
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0722652941
• ISBN 13: 9780722652947
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 320
• Editor: Palmer Roy