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Balaclava / The Light Brigade

[ Roud 1443 ; Master title: Balaclava ; Ballad Index Doe276 ; trad.]

Walter Pardon sang Balaclava on his 1977 Trailer album Our Side of the Baulk.

Roy Harris sang Balaclava in 1979 on the his Fellside album The Rambling Soldier that was published as a companion to Roy Palmer’s 1977 book The Rambling Soldier. Paul Adams noted:

The Crimean War (1853-6) inspired a tremendous outpouring of songs, many of which were printed as street ballads. The Battle of Balaclava (25 October 1854) is chiefly remembered because of that monumental error, the Charge of the Light Brigade. The song, which is bellicose rather than critical, has remained in oral circulation to this day—Walter Pardon has a version—and the tune used here can be traced back to an Irish veteran of the Crimea.

Roy Last from Mendlesham Green sang The Battle of Balaclava in a recording made by John Howson in 1983. It was released in 1988 on the Veteran Tapes cassette Songs Sung in Suffolk Vol. 3. This track was also included in 2009 on the CD reissue of the 1993 Veteran Tapes double cassette, Many a Good Horseman. John Howson noted:

The Battle of Balaclava, which included the Charge of the Light Brigade, took place on 25 October 1854. Like many other battles of the Crimean War it was celebrated in street ballads, including this one, Oh ’Tis a Famous Story, or Balaclava, published by Such in London. It is not a common ballad in oral repertoire, but it was a favourite of Norfolk singer Walter Pardon and it was featured on the now deleted LP Our Side of the Baulk.

Jeff Wesley sang The Light Brigade on his 2006 album Rum and Raspberry. It was recorded on 19 November 2005 at The White Lion, Wherwell, Hampshire, in front of an invited audience. He noted:

Another song from New England. The singer was Captain Patrick Tayluer from Maine. He served in the British Lancers in W.W.1, so he could have learned it then.

Lyrics

Walter Pardon sings Balaclava

Six hundred stalwart warriors, of England’s pride the best,
Did grasp the lance and sabre on Balaclava’s crest;
And with their trusty leader, Earl Cardigan the brave,
Dashed through the Russian valley to glory or a grave.

Their foemen stood in thousands, a dark and awful mass,
Beneath their famous strongholds resolved to guard the pass;
Their guns with fierce defiance belched thunders up the vale,
Where sat our English horsemen firm beneath their iron gale.

O ’tis a famous story, proclaim it far and wide,
And let your children’s children re-echo it with pride.
How Cardigan the fearless, his name immortal made,
When he crossed that Russian Valley with his famous Light Brigade.

When Nolan brought the order, “Great God, can it be true?”
Cried Cardigan the fearless, “And my Brigade so few;
To take these awful cannon from yonder teeming mass;
Tis madness, sir, where shall we charge? What guns bring from the pass?”

The messenger with hauteur looked once at the brave Earl,
Then pointing to the enemy, his lip began to curl.
“There, there, my lord, there are your guns and there your foemen too”,
Then turned his charger’s head away, and bade the Earl adieu.

And they were but six hundred, ’gainst two score thousand foes,
Hemmed in with furious cannon, and crushed with savage blows;
Yet fought they there like heroes, for our noble England’s fame;
O glorious charge, heroic deed! what glory crowns thy name.

Four hundred of those soldiers fell, fighting where they stood.
And thus that fatal death vale they enriched with English blood;
Four hundred of those soldiers bequeathed their lives away,
To the England they had fought for on that wild October day.

Roy Last sings Balaclava

It is a famous story, proclaim it far and wide,
And let your children’s children make the echo ring.
How Cardigan the fearless, his name immortal made
When he crossed the Russian valley with his gallant Light Brigade.

Horty Nolan brought the order: “Good God can it be true?”
Cried Cardigan the fearless, “And my brigade so few!
To face those deadly cannon from yonder teeming mass.
Why it’s madness sir: where shall we charge, what gun bring up the pass?”

”There, there my lord, there are the guns, there are your foemen too.”
He turned his horse’s head away and he bid the Earl adieu.

Then six hundred stalwart warriors, of England’s pride the best,
Did grasp the lance and sabre on Balaclava’s crest.
And with their trusty leader, Earl Cardigan the brave,
They crossed that Russian valley, to glory and the grave.