This Remembrance I am releasing a recent ‘live performance' video, of a song called Delville Wood, that I wrote after visiting the WW1 battlefields a few years ago. I went to Delville Wood early one morning, and the song conveys my experience of that peaceful, and tranquil morning. However, to help you understand the song a little better, let me give you some background information.
In July 1916 Delville Wood became an objective for the allied army, trying to dislodge the Germans from the village of Longueval, as part of the battle of the Somme.
The wood formed an area of 156 acres of trees, with dense undergrowth, and seamed grassy rides running through it. Its western border laid on a ridge, on the edge of the village.
At 5am on 15th July, 3153 officers and men of the 1st South African Infantry Brigade penetrated the wood, and secured a bridgehead, forming most of the wood. The soldiers named the grassy rides and bridleways running through the wood after well known streets in London, Glasgow and Edinburgh. Thus, Princes Street, Regent Street, Rotten Row, to name but a few.
For four days they fought heroically to hold the wood, whilst under heavy artillery bombardment, and fought off many German counter attacks. However on 20th July they had to withdraw from the wood. Only 780 men were present for roll call that day. The wood had been completely destroyed, and laid in splinters. Only one of the original trees, a hornbeam survived the devastation, and lives to this day.
Today the whole wood has been replanted. It was purchased by the South African Government in 1920, and now acts as a monument, museum, and final resting place for thousands of soldiers whose bodies were never recovered.
For more detailed information please visit the official Delville Wood website here.
It is a beautiful, though moving, place to visit.
I hope that you enjoy the song, and it’s sentiments, and that you are able to spare a couple of minutes yourself, to remember, in your own personal way.
Here is the recent live performance of the song.
DELVILLE WOOD
Nothing moved in Princes Street / Nobody there, no-one to greet you / No piercing scream, no metal clang / Just the sound of the birds, as they chattered and sang / Nothing moved, nothing should / All lay quiet in Delville Wood // In Regent Street, no shoppers there / Just a couple of silent grazing deer / In the morning light, in a wooded glade / Laying quietly upon the brave / Nothing moved, nothing should / All lay quiet in Delville Wood // A careless footprint in Rotten Row / At the sudden noise, they turn, they go / Across the gentle furrows which in the soil remain / Which belie the carnage, the suffering, the pain / Then nothing moved, nothing should / All lay quiet in Delville Wood / Nothing moved, nothing should / All lay quiet in Delville Wood //.