Number One Burnside was home
Mary McDermott lived there alone
Since Jamie the lad from next door
Followed the piper and went tae the war
Mary and Jamie
They worked on the land
When she was eighteen
They would wed, it was planned
They'd wanted each other
Since they met at first
For Mary was Jamie's
And Jamie was hers...
But Kitchener's call of
"Your Country Needs You!",
Took Jamie away
From the land that he knew
With the brashness of youth
And a trusting in chance
He left Mary in Geddes
And set forth for France
And Number One Burnside was home
Mary McDermott lived there alone
Since Jamie the lad from next door
Followed the piper and went tae the war..
The romance of the trenches
is glory and blood
the truth is of festering
of cold and of mud.
The cold just gets colder,
The ulcers won't heal
No words ever written
can say how you feel.
But over the top,
through the gas and the mire
Went countless young men
from both sides of the wire,
They fought for their country
did Tommy and Hun
But the dead in the field
are past caring who won.
Number one Burnside was home
Mary McDermott lived there alone
Since Jamie the lad from next door
Followed the piper and went tae the war..
Number Two Burnside
the telegraph came,
The message said missing,
The date and the name
Mary kept dry eyed,
She knew in her soul
Till Jamie came back,
She would never be whole..
She carried the water
from the well to her door,
cooked on the fire
and went on as before
She promised herself
that when Jamie came home,
Things would be just the same
As the things he's left from...
And Number One Burnside was home,
Mary McDermott lived there alone
Since Jamie the lad from next door
Followed the piper and went tae the war..
Sixty years later
Her dark hair turned grey,
They took Mary away
from her life's home one day.
They said she was too old
to walk to the well
how e'er well intentioned,
They'd broken the spell.
One Night, not much later,
She heard Jamie, say:
«Come on with me Mary,
it's time we're away»,
the care worker smiled
as she stroked Mary's brow,
«Your waiting is over,
you're with Jamie now ».
And Number Two Burnside is home,
Mary McDermott's no longer alone
She now has what she waited for
The piper is gone,
Jamie's back from the war...
Mary McDermott lived there alone
Since Jamie the lad from next door
Followed the piper and went tae the war
Mary and Jamie
They worked on the land
When she was eighteen
They would wed, it was planned
They'd wanted each other
Since they met at first
For Mary was Jamie's
And Jamie was hers...
But Kitchener's call of
"Your Country Needs You!",
Took Jamie away
From the land that he knew
With the brashness of youth
And a trusting in chance
He left Mary in Geddes
And set forth for France
And Number One Burnside was home
Mary McDermott lived there alone
Since Jamie the lad from next door
Followed the piper and went tae the war..
The romance of the trenches
is glory and blood
the truth is of festering
of cold and of mud.
The cold just gets colder,
The ulcers won't heal
No words ever written
can say how you feel.
But over the top,
through the gas and the mire
Went countless young men
from both sides of the wire,
They fought for their country
did Tommy and Hun
But the dead in the field
are past caring who won.
Number one Burnside was home
Mary McDermott lived there alone
Since Jamie the lad from next door
Followed the piper and went tae the war..
Number Two Burnside
the telegraph came,
The message said missing,
The date and the name
Mary kept dry eyed,
She knew in her soul
Till Jamie came back,
She would never be whole..
She carried the water
from the well to her door,
cooked on the fire
and went on as before
She promised herself
that when Jamie came home,
Things would be just the same
As the things he's left from...
And Number One Burnside was home,
Mary McDermott lived there alone
Since Jamie the lad from next door
Followed the piper and went tae the war..
Sixty years later
Her dark hair turned grey,
They took Mary away
from her life's home one day.
They said she was too old
to walk to the well
how e'er well intentioned,
They'd broken the spell.
One Night, not much later,
She heard Jamie, say:
«Come on with me Mary,
it's time we're away»,
the care worker smiled
as she stroked Mary's brow,
«Your waiting is over,
you're with Jamie now ».
And Number Two Burnside is home,
Mary McDermott's no longer alone
She now has what she waited for
The piper is gone,
Jamie's back from the war...
Contributed by giorgio - 2013/6/2 - 20:24
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Lyrics & Music by Iain Scally
Album: The Piper has Gone
Another song by Iain Scally.. In his own words it's not a protest song, but touches on the effect of the 1914-18 war on those left behind..
It's a story which involves an old lady who used to live in the cottage adjoining our house at the time. Jamie, the hero, was a ghostly figure who used to, "appear", quite regularly and took the form of a WW1 soldier and Mary was an idiosyncratic old character who refused to have any modern conveniences installed in her home by the landlord despite all his best efforts. She died, having reached the ripe old age of 80-odd still burning the paraffin lamp and carrying water from the well at the end of the village all her days. The idea of making them an item was my fertile imagination seeking an explanation for her reluctance to move forward.