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Monday, October 7, 2019

Negro Troops in World War I Had Own Work and Marching Songs, Oct. 7, 1919

From the Chicago Tribune as reprinted on the front page of The Monroe Journal, October 7, 1919

Old Time Songs That the Darkey Doughboys Sang. . . It’s Me, O Lawd, Standin’ in the Need of Prayer,” Was One of Their Favorites as They Marched

Charles N. Wheeler

Some highbrow once said that the only pure folklore we have in the United States are the old-time melodies and campmeeting songs of the Southern negroes. One starts thinking of the proposition over as the lines colored doughboys swing down the sycamore lined roadways of France in the dusk of the evening, singing in that quavering, strident, half-moaning voice that surely has the elements of both primitiveness and originality.

A long line of colored troopers were marching along a hillside in the zone of operations one evening as we came upon them. Long before we met up with them the melody of some old plantation song could be recognized. As we approached them the words could be distinguished.

“It’s me, O Lawd, standin’ in the need o’ prayer;
It’s me O Lawd, standin’ in the need o’ prayer;

Then, a high-pitched, quavering piercing voice—the leader—rose above the voice of the many heavy boots on the cobblestone road:
“Not my mother, not my sister” and then the whole company in the great perfervid primitive prayer:
“It’s me, O Lawd, standin’ in the need o’ prayer;
It’s me, O Lawd, standin’ in the need o’ prayer.”

Again the high-pitched voice of the leader:
“Not the elder, not the chaplain,” and then the whole company:
“It’s me, O Lawd, standin’ in the need o’ prayer.”

It has a swing to it that cannot be described without the notes. Lieutenant Senny (white), a Plattsburg and Harvard man, who had charge of this company, told me that he couldn’t possibly have a finer lot of soldiers under him than these negro boys. He encouraged them to use their plantation songs, and kept them at it for months, until they have no fear of Huns or death or anything in the world—if only their hearts can give voice to the stirring melodies.

A platoon of Georgia boys, so the story runs, were digging a trench not many miles behind No Man’s Land one afternoon. The sun was shining down pretty warm, and they grew off their helmets. The dirt was flying over their heads and the low humming voices blended beautifully.
“It’s me, O Lawd, standin’ in the need o’ prayer.”

Fritz, with a load of aerial bombs, nosed his Gotha in the direction of this platoon and was soon over them before they noticed him. He let drop a couple of bombs that fell uncomfortably near the trench. Then he swooped down and unlimbered his machine gun with that put-put-put accompaniment that induces one to hunt for the dugout.

Just one man in the platoon lost his bearings for the moment. He was a Georgian about six feet two inches tall, lean and lanky, but very powerful. He leaped out of his trench, so the boys say, and legged it over the hillside in mighty jumps. He didn’t wait to recover his helmet but held the shovel over his head as he departed, and with nearly every jump, they hear shout:

“O Lawd, keep ‘em high!
O Lawd, keep ‘em high!”

And back in the trench the platoon was hurling dirt over their heads as dirt never before was scooped up in shovels, and accompanied by the humming voices, now a little louder and with a sort of accelerated and staccato punctuation:

“It’s me, O Lawd, standin’ in the need o’ prayer.”

This same squad between songs has another story they think is all right. One of the boys had been up at the front and gone over the top a couple of times. When he was sent back for a rest a brother colored soldier from Mississippi edged up to him, showed two perfectly fine rows of perfectly white teeth and inquired:

“Say, boss, what you all mean by dis ober de top stuff?”

The boy who had experienced the sensation looked at him seriously for a moment and replied:

“Say, boy, when dem orders do com and dat zero hour am sturck, and day’s gwine ober dat top, it just am ‘Good night, world; good mawnin’ Pearly Gates.’”

One of their most popular marching songs that has a swing to it that is irresistible, that must ease up the muscles in the legs like Alexander’s rag does to a Chicagoan of the Caucasian breed, deals with the mourner.

It requires a leader with that high pitched, quavering, thrilling voice to make it go just right. The leader shouts: “O moanaw” (mourner), and the great plea comes from the whole company, “Doan stay away.” The leader again pierces the night with that strident cry, “O backslider” and the chorus rolls over the hills, “doan stay away.” The leader usually repeats the same saluation several times. His appeal is to the moanaw, the blackslider, the deacon, and the elder, and the wonderful blending of voices, like the diapason from the pipes of a great organ, rolls forth again and again, “Doan stay away.”

“Lil Liza Jane” is another powerful harmony they use a good deal. It requires an accomplished leader to make the salutation of the first line with the chorus landing on the “Lil Liza Jane,” which is repeated over and over, and the more times it is repeated, the more eloquent becomes the spirit of the man.

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