I Didn't Raise My Boy to Be a Soldier

anonymous

Ten million soldiers to the war have gone
who may never return again;
Ten million mother's hearts
must break for the ones who died in vain.
Head bowed down in sorrow in her lonely years,
I heard a mother murmer through her tears:

I didn't raise my boy to be a soldier,
I brought him up to be my pride and joy.
Who dares to place a musket on his shoulder
to shoot some other mother's darling boy?

Let nations arbitrate their future troubles.
It's time to lay the sword and gun away.
There'd be no war today if mothers all would say,
I didn't raise my boy to be a soldier.

What victory can cheer a mother's heart
when she looks at her blighted home?
What victory can bring her back
all she cared to call her own?

Let each mother answer in the year to be,
Remember that my boy belongs to me!

I didn't raise my boy to be a soldier,
I brought him up to be my pride and joy.
Who dares to place a musket on his shoulder
to shoot some other mother's darling boy?

Let nations arbitrate their future troubles.
It's time to lay the sword and gun away.
There'd be no war today if mothers all would say,
I didn't raise my boy to be a soldier.