The tune was written around 1855 by William Steffe. The lyrics at that time were alternately called "Canaan's Happy Shore" or "Brothers, Will You Meet Me?" and the song was sung as a campfire spiritual. The tune spread across the United States, taking on many sets of new lyrics.
Thomas Bishop, from Vermont, joined the Massachusetts Infantry before the outbreak of war and wrote a popular set of lyrics, circa 1860, titled "John Brown's Body" which became one of his unit's walking songs. According to writer Irwin Silber (who has written a book about Civil War folksongs), the original lyrics were not about John Brown, the famed abolitionist, but a Scotsman of the same name who was a member of the 12th Massachusetts Regiment. An article by writer Mark Steyn maintains that the men of John Brown's unit had made up a song poking fun at him, and sang it widely. Though "Canaan's Happy Shore" has a verse and chorus of equal metrical length, "John Brown's Body" has a longer verse to accommodate the words packed into its line.
Bishop's battalion was dispatched to Washington, D.C. early in the Civil War, and Julia Ward Howe heard this song during a public review of the troops in Washington. Whatever the accuracy of Silber's and Steyn's accounts, the lyrics heard by Howe were about John Brown the abolitionist. Her companion at the review, the Reverend James Clarke, suggested to Howe that she write new words for the fighting men's song. Staying at the Willard Hotel in Washington on the night of November 18, 1861, Howe awoke with the words of the song in her mind and in near darkness wrote the verses to the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/richards/howe/howe-I.html.
Howe's "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" was first published on the front page of The Atlantic Monthly of February 1862. The sixth verse written by Howe, which is less commonly sung, was not published at that time. The song was also published as a broadside in 1863 by the Supervisory Committee for Recruiting Colored Regiments in Philadelphia. In Howe's lyrics, the words of the verse are packed into a longer line, contrasted with the chorus's short refrain.
Julia Ward Howe was the wife of Samuel Gridley Howe, the famed scholar in education of the blind. Samuel and Julia were also active leaders in anti-slavery politics and strong supporters of the Union.
I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps,
They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps:
His day is marching on.
(Chorus)
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
His day is marching on.
I have read a fiery gospel writ in burnished rows of steel:
"As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal;
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel,
Since God is marching on."
(Chorus)
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Since God is marching on.
He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment-seat:
Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him! be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on.
(Chorus)
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Our God is marching on.
In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me:
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,
While God is marching on.
(Chorus)
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
While God is marching on.
He is coming like the glory of the morning on the wave,
He is Wisdom to the mighty, He is Succour to the brave,
So the world shall be His footstool, and the soul of Time His slave,
Our God is marching on.
(Chorus)
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Our God is marching on.
Notes
In later years, when this song was sung in a non-military environment, the clause "let us die to make men free" was sometimes changed to "let us live to make men free".
The sixth verse is often omitted. Also, a common variant changes "soul of Time" to "soul of wrong", and "succour" to "honor".
An alternate verse was written by Don Moen for release on the Hosanna! Music project "Army of God" in 1988. It was written to accompany verses 1 and 5 and is as follows:
I can almost hear the trumpet sound, the Lord's return is near,
But there're still so many people lost, somehow they've got to hear;
Lord, please give me one more hour, one more day, just one more year,
The US Army Chorus sang "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" at the ceremony welcoming Pope Benedict XVI to the White House on April 16, 2008. The version was praised across the media. Talk show host Rush Limbaugh replayed the version multiple times in the days that followed; CBS News's Harry Smith wrote that he wept after hearing it. [2]
In popular culture
The lyrics of the Battle Hymn of the Republic appear in Martin Luther King, Jr.'s sermons and speeches, most notably in his speech "How Long, Not Long" from the steps of the Montgomery, Alabama Courthouse on March 25th, 1965 after the 3rd Selma March, and in his final sermon delivered in Memphis, Tennessee on the evening of April 3rd, 1968, the night before his assassination. In fact, the latter sermon, King's last public words, ends with the first lyrics of the Battle Hymn, "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord."
The song was all but forgotten until the 1940s, when choral conductor Fred Waring re-introduced The Battle Hymn on his network radio show during World War II. It was such a hit for his group, the Pennsylvanians, that Waring featured it as the closing number in his live concerts for the next 32 years. Waring is also credited with changing the lyric line "let us die to make men free" to "let us live to make men free" in the late 1940s. Proof of this is found in the radio air checks and TV kinescopes from the late 1940s and early 1950s housed at the Fred Waring's America Special Collection at Penn State University.
In 1993, Sweet Honey in the Rock recorded "Sojourner's Battle Hymn," which they adapted from Sojourner Truth's version of the Battle Hymn of the Republic. Truth had written her version, "The Valiant Soldiers," as a marching song for colored regiments in the Civil War. [3][4] This appears to be the same song as Captain Lindley Miller's "Marching Song of the First Arkansas."
In 1946 the song was sung as a peace anthem at the Peace World Scout Jamboree in France, following which the Scout troop of the Merida´s Mexico 3 Group adopted the song as their anthem.
In 1980 the song was sung in an original version from the 1860s during a music festival to celebrate the 350th anniversary of the City of Boston.
In television
Judy Garland performed the song on an episode of The Judy Garland Show in late 1963 in honor of recently-assassinated President John F. Kennedy. Garland and Kennedy were close friends. It was also played at Garland's funeral.
The song plays as the soundtrack in The West Wing episode 20 Hours in America, Part I. In the episode, President Bartlet has just finished addressing a group of sailors and Marines and is seen walking under an American flag with the song playing in the background.
An episode of Andromeda is called To Loose The Fateful Lightning.
An episode of The 4400 is called Terrible Swift Sword.
Can be heard on some Barney & Friends episodes as the song S-M-I-L-E and (S)He Waded in the Water
In an episode of Band of Brothers the soldiers sing the song with alternative lyrics about the life as a paratrooper, called Blood on the Risers.
In an episode of Most Haunted, the crew sings it in the Whaley House in San Diego to draw out the spirit of James Whaley.
On the episode "The Flood" of the cartoon show Hey Arnold!, 4th grade teacher Mr. Simmons (voiced by Dan Butler) sings part of the song when he is on the edge of falling off of a ladder into the flood waters.
In the episode of The Simpsons entitled Deep Space Homer, Buzz Aldrin and Race Banyon are humming this song during a risky re-entry of their space shuttle into Earth.
In film
The tune of the song has been used in at least 44 films to date, the first being Mother Machree in 1928 and the most recent Rocket Science in 2007.
In the 1989 film UHF, after Stanley Spadowski gives the inspirational speech, "Life is like a mop...." while the song plays in the background.
The tune of the hymn is the basis for a scene in American History X, during which Ethan Suplee's character is singing along to modified lyrics to reflect neo-nazi sentiments.
Used in the film "Inherit the Wind."
In the film "Wild Wild West" played sarcastically by the villain, Arliss Loveless.
In the film "Foursome" when Donny is hearing about beautiful shots in golf, the chorus to this song is hummed by the other two players.
In the film "Rocket Science" this is the song used to help a teenage debate student express himself.
In the film Young Frankenstein it is sung briefly several times by one of the characters.
In the film "Death to Smoochy" played at the start of a Smoochy Show after Smoochy gets framed for being a Nazi.
In the movie "Operation Delta Force 5: Random Fire" the main antagonist, Jafari bin Assim sings the chorus of the song in order to force his hostages into committing a terrorist act
In games
In the 1991 computer game, Sid Meier's Civilization, a variation on Battle Hymn played in a minor key was used as the theme song for Abe Lincoln, leader of the Americans.
William R. Forstchen's The Lost Regimentscience fiction book series features four books whose titles are taken from lyrics from the song (Terrible Swift Sword, Fateful Lightning, Battle Hymn and Never Sound Retreat).
Jerry Pournelle's 1975 short story His Truth Goes Marching on begins with the main character humming the song.
Colonel Dean E. Hess, U.S. Air Force, an ordained minister who left the clergy to fly over 300 combat missions as a fighter pilot in World War II and the Korean War, titled his 1957 autobiography Battle Hymn. It was in turn adapted into a film of the same title.
Terrible Swift Sword and Never Call Retreat are the titles of the second and third volumes of Bruce Catton's Centennial History of the Civil War.
In the book Eclipse (novel), the third book of the Twilight series written by Stephenie Meyer, Alice translates the hymn into Arabic in order to hide her thoughts from Edward.
The Battle Hymn was played at the conclusion of the National Service of Prayer and Remembrance on Friday, September 14, 2001.
The Battle Hymn was played by the band outside Buckingham Palace, the primary residence of HM The Queen as an immediate tribute to the dead of 9/11 on September 12, 2001. The Guards outside the palace normally play British patriotic anthems and songs, making this a deliberate exception staged as a gesture of respect to the victims of 9/11 and an expression of Great Britain's solidarity with America.
In sports
The Saint Joseph's University Pep Band plays the entire tune after home victories in its Alumni Memorial Fieldhouse. The school's fight song "Mine Eyes" is sung to the tune as well.
The tune was used for the Northern Irish football anthem, "We're Not Brazil, We're Northern Ireland"
The Cavalier Marching Band of the University of Virginia performs a University of Virginia fight song titled "Glory to Virginia" or simply "Glory," which takes its tune from the chorus, during the football pre-game show and at University sporting events.
Just before each University of Georgia football game begins, a lone trumpeter stands in the Southwest corner of Sanford Stadium and plays the first phrase, with the entire Redcoat Band joining after the first phrase. The UGA band also plays the entire song after home victories. The same is practiced at the beginning of basketball games, with the trumpeter at center court and the pep band joining in the song. The music for The Battle Hymn of the Republic is actually the basis for UGA's fight song: "Glory, Glory to Ol'Georgia," or just "Glory" as it is known. The Georgia Tech marching band also sings a parody called "To Hell With Georgia" under the stands of Bobby Dodd Stadium before every game.[6]
In the National Hockey League, the tune is used as a song against the Montreal Canadiens called "The Hab Song" which insults the team and its fans.
At the end of each Ole Miss sporting event, the band plays a song entitled "From Dixie With Love", which combines the southern tune "Dixie" with the Battle Hymn. Rabid Ole Miss fans end the song with the phrase "the south will rise again", rather than "His truth is marching on".
In 1994, on the occasion of the 1994 FIFA World Cup held in the United States, Daryl Hall – with the choral group The Sound of Blackness using the tone of the anthem – sang the official song of the event, "Gloryland".
The tune is used in Germany as a cheer for star forward Lukas Podolski, a player for FC Bayern Muenchen.
The United States Naval Academy's "The Goat is Old and Gnarly," sung most often by USNA plebes at the Army/Navy game, was adopted from the tune of the hymn.
The song is the trade mark song of the Troopers Drum and Bugle Corps from Casper, WY and is performed by them at nearly every performance as a warm up or even a part as their show.
The tune is also used to celebrate a try at Downlands MSC College in Toowoomba.
At Disneyland, the movie "America the Beautiful" shows, in one scene, a zoom-in of the statue of Abraham Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial; the Battle Hymn plays slowly and solemnly in the background.
In other songs
"Praise ye the name of the Lord" by Protopriest Mikhail Vinogradov, music for the Polyeleos, an element of the Orthodox Christian Matins service. Listen to MIDI
Melanie Safka's song "Psychotherapy", from the album "Leftover Wine" uses the melody to support lyrics satirising (mainly Freudian) psychology, with the chorus ending with the line "As the id goes marching on!"
"Flying Regulations", a post WWII jody takes its melody from the Battle Hymn. Oscar Brand recorded a version, titled "Glory Flying Regulations" for his album The Wild Blue Yonder.
The melody was given a new lyric as a song of the British soldiers in World War One: "They were only playing leapfrog ... when one staff officer jumped right over the other staff officer's back". The song was later discovered by Charles Chilton and used in the musical Oh! What a Lovely War
The first line of the hymn is also adopted in "These Things Take Time" by The Smiths: "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the sacred wunderkind / you took me behind a dis-used railway line".
The Christian metal band Stryper recorded a heavy metal version of the hymn for their 1985 album Soldiers Under Command. Since then, has been used as the intro to all their concerts. In a similar manner, Brazilian christian rock band Oficina G3 have recorded two versions of this song for their album Indiferença, the first one being a guitar solo based on the song, and the second one a sung rock version of it.
The Japanese electronics retailer Yodobashi Camera uses the melody of the song in their in-store advertising jingle. The lyrics are in Japanese and are about buying cameras and electronics.
British cult band Half Man Half Biscuit (a favorite of John Peel) recorded a track called "Vatican Broadside", which was sung to the melody of the song but with lyrics including the lines "The singer out of Slipknot went to Rome to see the Pope""..and the Pope said to his aide:" and the chorus: "who the fucking hell are Slipknot?""..in relation to me getting out of bed."
"Blood on the Risers", a World War II paratrooper song, had its melody taken from "The Battle Hymn of the Republic".
Basis of the drinking song Godiva's Hymn used by many engineering faculties
The first verse and chorus of The Battle Hymn of the Republic is sung in the background at the end of the Dream Theater song "In the Name of God" on their album Train of Thought. This rendition is possibly intended to be ironic, as it is sung in an uncharacteristic minor key.
A version of the hymn (the first verse and chorus only) with upbeat blues music called "Glory, Glory" was performed by Blues Traveler in their early years.
American rock band Clutch (band) quotes part of the chorus in their song "Pile Driver"
The 1991 March issue of MAD Magazine featured a parody of the song called "The Hymn of the Battered Republic", written by Frank Jacobs.
Schoolchildren all over the United States have sung an irreverent variation of the song beginning "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the burning of the school...".
Another wanton parody is a racist rendition featured in the movie American History X, sung by Ethan Suplee.
Yet another parody, "Hang Jeff Davis on a Sour Apple Tree/Down went McGinty to the bottom of the sea", has now become one of the official songs of the University of Pennsylvania.
In the 1960s absurdist classic The Principia Discordia, the tune is renamed The Battle Hymn of the Eristocracy, with new lyrics that include the line "Grand and Gory Ol' Discordja" as part of the chorus.
The radio show "A Prairie Home Companion" featured a version of the tune with the lyrics "One black bug bled blue-black blood while another black bug bled blue" and "One sliced snake slid up the slide while another sliced snake slid down", and the chorus "Glory, glory, how peculiar". The credits to its tenth anniversary show were set to the song, and began "A Prairie Home Companion was produced by Margaret Moos?" The "Me and Choir" monologue on the "Spring News from Lake Wobegon" tape and CD has a version of the burning of the school version as discussed above.
In Great Britain, scouts often sing the parody, "He jumped without a parachute from twenty thousand feet," when on camps.
Children delight in annoying adults and each other by singing the lyrics "I know a song that gets on everybody's nerves (x3) and this is how it goes" to the tune of the Battle Hymn.
Allan Sherman's "The Ballad of Harry Lewis", a song about a man dying while working in a cloth business.
Ina T and the RVs recorded a version titled "Honey, Have You Seen the Highway?", about an older couple who have trouble getting their bearings (Each verse ends with, "I think we're lost again!")
A parody called "I Wear My Pink Pajamas" has been used for decades to send children to bed. "I wear my pink pajamas in the summer when it's hot./ I wear my pink pajamas in the winter when it's not.(or, I wear my flannel nightie in the winter when it's not)/ But sometimes in the springtime and sometimes in the fall,/ I jump right into bed with nothin' on at all."
A popular summer camp song to the same tune goes: "I like bananas coconuts and grapes (x3) and that's why they call me Tarzan of the Apes!" where the first part of the song ("I like bananas...") is sung more quietly each time it is repeated and the second part of the song ("and that's why they call me...") is sung louder and louder.
There is another parody in the book "The Rule of Four" regarding the Tiger Inn and the other school clubs
In 1974 the popular BBC comedy trio "The Goodies" used the tune for their song "Father Christmas Do Not Touch Me", which was a double-A side with "The Inbetweenies" - a number 7 hit in January 1975.
Prof. Harold Baum's "The Battle Hymn of the Aerobes" in The Biochemists' Songbook describes the molecular machinery for oxidative phosphorylation in the membrane of the mitochondrion. LyricsMP3
Jackson, Popular Songs of Nineteenth-Century America, note on "Battle Hymn of the Republic", p. 263-4.
Scholes, Percy A. (1955). "John Brown's Body", The Oxford Companion of Music. Ninth edition. London: Oxford University Press.
Stutler, Boyd B. (1960). Glory, Glory, Hallelujah! The Story of "John Brown's Body" and "Battle Hymn of the Republic." Cincinnati: The C. J. Krehbiel Co.
Clifford, Deborah Pickman. (1978). Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory: A Biography of Julia Ward Howe. Boston: Little, Brown and Co.
Vowell, Sarah. (2005). "John Brown's Body," in The Rose and the Briar: Death, Love and Liberty in the American Ballad. Ed. by Sean Wilentz and Greil Marcus. New York: W. W. Norton.
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