More Songs We Sang (1959)

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MORE SONGS WE SANG

IN THE NEW ZEALAND FORCES OVER SEAS
By LES CLEVELAND and the D-DAY DODGERS

Side One

THE QUARTERMASTERS STORE
THE TRENTHAM BLUES
THE VETERANS REPLY and LITTLE MISS MUFFET MARCH
THE LOUSY LANCE CORPORAL
ISA LEI

Side Two

THE BATTLE OF COCONUT GROVE
LILI MARLENE
CASTELFRENTANO
MAMA
DUGOUT IN MATRUH
MAORI BATTALION

The Artists

Vocal: Lcs Cleveland with Alec Veysey, Mike Bennett, Basel Tubert and Jim McNaught.
Musical Direction: Ken Avery.

Instrumental: Bob Barcham, piano and piano-accordion; Denny Mahn, trombone; John Mahn, trumpet; Morry Simpson, drums; Doug Brewer, string bass; Ken Avery, clarinet.

The tradition* of the New Zealand Armed Forces are rich in folklore. Most of the . songs of the rank and file of World War II are even more interesting today than perhaps they seemed 15 years ago. They contain a valuable insight into the minds of a whole (feneration of servicemen,, They are unofficial history part of a great sprawling body of belief, humour, protest and comic fantasy, which seldom finds its way into cold, official archives.

The Kiwi soldier is not emotionally demonstrative but these soldiers' songs range from boisterous comedy to rough satire, with sometimes a brief glimpse of tragic experience.

The following notes are a guide to the origins of the material which has been collected by Les Cleveland—himself a former 2NZEF infantryman, and well known in New Zealand as a journalist, broadcaster and mountaineer.

THE QUARTERMASTER'S STORE

A traditional song of World War 1 which was still current in World War II. Version* vary according to different unit traditions.

TRENTHAM BLUES

Many men called up for active service overseas groused at the monotony of typical New Zealand training camps like Burnham, Trentham, Papakura and Waiouru. While they were waiting to join reinforcement drafts for convoy to the Middle East, they found that much Army life consisted of elementary drill guards and fatigues. In Trentham this programme was varied with spells of work on the Wellington wharves, and storing enormous loads of ammunition (much of which was never afterwards used) in dumps around the Hutt Valley at places like Belmont. The 11th Reinforcement 2NZEF sailed in two sections. The Trentham Blues was a song composed by men in the second section who thought that because they were nominally designated as machine gunners they ought to be given more glamorous tasks than guards and fatigues while they were awaiting their turn for transit to the Middle East and Italy in 1944.

THE VETERAN'S REPLY

Expresses the present-day sentiments of many diggers who recall the difference between what they actually saw and did at the war. and what history has subsequently made of it all. The recitation is a piece of unofficial doggerel current in returned services' circles at Whakatane.

LITTLE MISS MUFFET

Another traditional Army marching song of uncertain origins.

THE LOUSY LANCE CORPORAL

Originated with the Australian Forces in World War I and is part of the standing body of ANZAC folklore which was passed on to many hundreds of thousands of young soldiers when they were called up in the 1939-45 struggle. Versions vary according to the whims of the singer, but the central image of all of them is the confrontation of the brass hats and hangers-on of the headquarters staff, by the grim,infuriated digger who has come back to see for himself what has been going on.

In 2NZEF circles the term "bludger" came to mean almost anybody who was notin the fighting part of the Division (or who had not served at some time in it). A small eminence in Maadi Camp in Egypt, where the headquarters of the N.Z. Division were situated, in 1940, was universally known as "Sludgers' Hill".

ISA LEI

Heard in Fiji by the original Eighth Brigade Group, who were sent there early in the war when it was thought a Japanese invasion was imminent; acquired by the 3rd New Zealand Division which absorbed the brigade group when it reformed in New Zealand for battle in the Parifiv: played on ceremonial occasions by the Divisional brass hand; and sung with solemn feeling by the 15,000 troops who made up the bulk of the reorganised Division when they sailed out of Auckland Harbour in 1943 on the American liner Westpoint..

The song was originally composed by a German named Busch, In Hawaii in the 1880s. From there it travelled to Tonga where it achieved some popularity under the Tnngan title "Si'i Lili Viola Lose Hina". About the year 1918 it was introduced into

the Lau Islands of the Fiji Group by a Tongan named Pasoni, and here it was an enormous success. The Fijian lyric, heard on the record, was written by the High Chief of Lau, Ratu Tevita, and the words express a song of lament at departing from Fiji. "Isa lei!" in Fijian is an exclamation of regret, equivalent to the English "Alas!"

THE BATTLE OF COCONUT GROVE

As sung by men of C Company, 29th Battalion in Namaka Camp, Fiji, 1940. This is a typical piece of wartime satire. Troops who served in Fiji and other island garrisons were depressed by poor food, rough living and monotony. The number of "enemy" scares and false alarms was also a source of ribald protest. This song pours ridicule on the activities of the army in Fiji and on the journalistic accounts of themselves which the astonished troops often came across in the New Zealand press afterwards. The references to a "pouch full of lead heads" applies to a classic piece of Army folklore about an occasion when ammunition boxes hastily sent to Fiji when the panic was on, were found on arrival to contain leadhead nails.

LILI MARLENE

A sentimental German composition which was sung in a variety of languages by German and Allied forces. The opening stanzas of this version were composed by New Zealanrlers serving in the Italian campaign in 1944. At this time there were problems of morale in the Division and many of the long service men who had seen hard fighting in the desert battles were anxious to be allowed to return to New Zealand on furlough. They felt their places should be taken by younger soldiers from New Zealand. Their arguments were brought unofficially to the attention of superior authority in typically New Zealand fashion in the form of song addressed to the wartime Prime Minister, Peter Fraser, who visited the troops in Italy in May 1944, It is not recorded whether or not Mr Fraser was moved by these unorthodox tactics, but after his departure the 4th Reinforcements were relieved and other veterans followed them home as shipping became available.

C4STELFRENTANO

A battlefield lament sung by men of the Maori Battalion and other frontline troops after the bloody fighting in December 1943 around Orsogna. a hilltop fortress in the south of Italy, Castelfrentano is a nearby town of about €.000 people between the Sangro River and Orsogna, itself. The song brings up the memory of comrades who fell in the Sangro battles and recalls the sound of the Castelfrentano bell. This town had been peacefully occupied by Sixth Brigade forces, so that the image of the bell contrasts with the violence and stress of the surrounding battlefields. Nevertheless, the bell poses an ominous question: "Where are you going?" As was to emerge, the infantry faced even more costly and exhausting struggles ahead—Cassino was where they were going. Still, the song concludes with the resolute sentiment that the continuing struggle is preferable to the potential pleasures represented by rich northern industrial cities like Milan. Why? Because at that stage of the campaign. Milan and the north were full of Fascists and German occupying forces. It was a symbol of everything that the Allies were committed to destroying,

MAMA

A popular Italian ballad about how nice it would be back home with Mama, that was enjoyed by all who served in Italy.

DUGOUT IN MATRUH

Mersa Matruh is a coastal settlement in the Egyptian desert between Baggush and Sidi Barrani. It was used as a defensive position and a supply point repeatedly during the ups and downs of the desert campaigns. Extensive trench systems, minefields and gunpits. constructed by cursing, sweating troops, were never subsequently put to much use by them. The area was a rendezvous for the N.Z. Division during the confusing events that followed the Eighth Army retreat from Tobruk. To grim digs of the early campaigns, places like Mersa Matruh and the Baggush Box became symbols for heat, monotony, homesickness, thirst, flies, confusion and bombing raids.

MAORI BATTALION

A patriotic marching song written at the beginning of World War II by Ansnia Te Amohau, then a corporal in the N.Z. Forces,

Also Available: THE SONGS WE SANG KIWI LA-3

An earlier release obtainable from all record dealers. 10 inch L.P. Contains
other famous N.Z. services songs including Saida Bint. My Africa Star, Good
Ship "Venus". The Army in Fiji. Aiwa Saida, My A.25, etc.

Also available from A. H. & A. W. Reed and from Editorial Services Ltd.,
Wellington, words and music of a collection of N.Z. Army and Services ballads
with Neville Colvin's wartime illustrations.                           Retail Price 10s, 6d,

Note: This Kiwi record is the subject of copyright.


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