Talk:Soldier's poem

Origins

In Fred R. Shapiro, The Yale Book of Quotations (2006), p. 128, this is described as a variant of a poem by Frank B. Camp. It is a loose adaptation of the original:

• When the final taps is sounded and we lay aside life's cares,
  And we do the last and glories parade, on Heaven's shining stairs,
  And the angels bid us welcome and the harps begin to play,
  We can draw a million canteen checks and spend them in a day,
  It is then we'll hear St. Peter tell us loudly with a yell,
  "Take a front seat you soldier men, you've done your hitch in Hell."
  • Frank Bernard Camp, "Our Hitch in Hell", st. 6, in American Soldier Ballads (1917), p. 21

The original poem was apparently popular enough to have been widely plagiarized in periodicals by 1920; but today the variants are more well known than the original. ~ Ningauble 12:12, 13 July 2011 (UTC)