[Editor: This poem by Mary Gilmore was published in The Australian Women’s Weekly, 29 June 1940, during the Second World War (1939-1945).]
No foe shall gather our harvest
Sons of the mountains of Scotland,
Clansmen from correi and kyle,
Bred of the moors of England,
Children of Erin’s green isle,
We stand four-square to the tempest,
Whatever the battering hail —
No foe shall gather our harvest,
Or sit on our stockyard rail.
Our women shall walk in honor,
Our children shall know no chain,
This land that is ours forever
The invader shall strike at in vain.
Anzac! … Bapaume! … and the Marne! …
Could ever the old blood fail?
No foe shall gather our harvest,
Or sit on our stockyard rail.
So hail-fellow-met we muster,
And hail-fellow-met fall in,
Wherever the guns may thunder,
Or the rocketing “air mail” spin!
Born of the soil and the whirlwind,
Though death itself be the gale —
No foe shall gather our harvest,
Or sit on our stockyard rail.
We are the sons of Australia,
Of the men who fashioned the land,
We are the sons of the women
Who walked with them, hand in hand;
And we swear by the dead who bore us,
By the heroes who blazed the trail,
No foe shall gather our harvest,
Or sit on our stockyard rail.
— MARY GILMORE.
At 75, Australian poet and writer Mary Gilmore, Dame of the British Empire, has written one of the finest Australian songs of the war. It appears above. “I’m too old to do many of the things I would like to do to win the war,” she said, “but I can still write. Here is a song for the men and women of Australia.” The inspiring note in the song is so vividly Australian that The Women’s Weekly is proud to present it to readers.
Source:
The Australian Women’s Weekly (Sydney, NSW), 29 June 1940, p. 5
Editor’s notes:
Anzac = Anzac Cove, a cove on the western coast of the Gallipoli peninsula (part of the section of Eastern Europe held by Turkey), located on the European side of the Dardanelles strait; where the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) landed and fought against the Turkish army in 1915
Bapaume = a town in northern France, which was captured by the German army, and regained by Allied forces (including Australians) in March 1917; it was recaptured by the Germans a week later, and subsequently regained by the Allies in September 1918
correi = a steep-sided hollow on a hillside or mountainside, especially referring to one in the mountains of Scotland (also spelt as “corrie”; also called a “cirque” or “cwm”)
Erin = Ireland
kyle = (Scottish) a narrow sea channel or strait (from the Gaelic “caol”, meaning “narrow”)
Marne = the Marne River in France, around which the Second Battle of the Marne was fought in 1918, between the Allied forces (including Australians) and the German army
Keen to discover when the words of this poem were changed (V1 L2 changed to “Welshmen of coomb and defile” and V2 L5 changed to “Anzac, Tobruk and Kokoda”) and whether Mary Gilmore made the changes or someone else (George Mackaness?), would really appreciate any info, thanks Mel and Susie
According to the The Australian Women’s Weekly of 22 April 1953 (p. 24) it was Mary Gilmore who made the changes.
“Dame Mary has altered the original version slightly. Here is the amended song:”
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article41408379
[The new version included the lines “Welshmen from crag and defile” and “Anzac! . . . Tobruk! . . . and Kokoda! . . .”.]
The new version had appeared three months earlier, in The Catholic Weekly (Sydney, NSW), 22 January 1953 (p. 7).
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article147086647
When the poem was set to music (see the NLA catalogue entry for the 1952 song: http://trove.nla.gov.au/version/7788633), that would have provided a good opportunity for changes to be made (but the song was not necessarily the impetus for any changes; unless evidence can be provided to the contrary). Unfortunately, a copy of the sheet music is not online.
It is interesting to note that a 1945 printing of the poem included the line “Anzac! . . . Tobruk, and Kokoda”, but without changing the line “Clansmen from corrie and kyle”.
See: The Dubbo Liberal and Macquarie Advocate (NSW), 18 August 1945, p. 1
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article133033379
Why is there no mention of Dr Percy Jones , Dr of music, who wrote the music for this sterling poem?
You are quite correct, Percy Jones wrote the music for the song of “No Foe Shall Gather Our Harvest”, which is on the National Library website at http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/6764868.
However, Percy Jones wasn’t mentioned in the above article, as it is a republication of an item from The Australian Women’s Weekly (29 June 1940), rather than being a research article about the work itself.
I would like to point out that the line “Our women shall walk in honor,” should that not be HONOUR the correct English spelling as I have seen in other copies of Mary’s poem. I would assume that with Mary being of Scottish heritage that would have been the original spelling
The source of this particular copy of the poem was The Australian Women’s Weekly, 29 June 1940, which published it with the word spelt as “honor”.
However, when the poem was included in Mary Gilmore’s 1954 collection of poetry, Fourteen Men, it was printed with the word spelt as “honour” (page 26).
The usual spelling of the word in British Commonwealth countries was “honour” – and therefore, as you indicate in your comment, it is likely that Gilmore’s original spelling of the word was “honour”.
Interestingly, “No foe shall gather our harvest, Or sit on our stockyard rail,” was written on the left edge of the Australian 1993 Series ten dollar note, but was removed from the latest issue of banknotes because the phrase was thought to be unwelcoming and threatening to newcomers to Australia.
Dave,
You stole my thunder; but you did it well.
I have often told my friends of this grave omission from our $10 note.
Most are totally ignorant and couldn’t care anyway.
The Woke must not be denied their beliefs. However maybe a few of us can gather the strength to have those wonderful words reinstated.
Who was behind its omission?
Rob Buntine
beeman43@icloud.com
Yes, it would be good to know the names of these faceless PC and Woke bureaucrats who are undermining our society.
They should be held directly responsible for their actions. Instead, they operate in the shadows, using our taxpayer money to push their Woke neo-communist agendas.
“Woke neo-communist agendas”? Oh, too funny. The 2% of fair dinkum Aussies that really believe this Trumpist fear-mongering have probably never heard of Mary Gilmour.
This genuine issue of her words being removed from the $10 note deserves better. Drop the anti-woke crap & just argue the issue: Gilmour’s poem is an Aussie icon, and we should all* be proud of what it meant to wartime Aussies.
*ALL Australians – including those who’ve only recently adopted our country as their home. ALL of us should be proud of Gilmour’s outstanding contribution to our literary heritage.
Non woke folk would like to see these words replaced on our $10 note
“No foe shall gather our harvest, Or sit on our stockyard rail.”
Learned this at Lyons state school, Victoria – still remember some of it.
I am fed up to the back teeth with reading this type of tripe. At the age of 90, (2000) my father told me he did not think we’d be able to hold onto this country. At the time I assumed he was talking about the threat of external forces, I have long since come to the conclusion that he was thinking the exact opposite and that we are more and more handing Australia over to the outside world on a platter.
“I am fed up to the back teeth with reading this type of tripe” – what the heck?!
This is a great poem. It is not tripe at all.
It was written at the time of the Second World War, when people were worried about Australia being invaded by the Japanese.
You are correct to say that “we are more and more handing Australia over to the outside world on a platter”, but that is a different matter to the WW2 Japanese threat.
In my humble opinion, “No Foe Shall Gather Our Harvest” is one of the greatest Australian poems ever.
I think you’ve missed the point. It’s not the poem that’s tripe but rather that we are succumbing to the woke society.
Thank you for explaining. Your anti-Woke message was not clear from what you wrote. If your message was written in direct reply to the anti-Woke comments of Dave Morley and Rob Buntine (above) then it would have been clear – but, as a stand-alone post, it was not clear at all; instead, it read as a direct comment on the poem itself.
You are spot-on in saying that “we are succumbing to the woke society”. The bowing down of society to these Leftards is ridiculous. I find it hard to believe that normal people are kowtowing to these Woke idiots. If we all stood up against the neo-communist Woke traitors, and the journo scumbags who help them, then our society would be much improved.
“Woke traitors, and the journo scumbags who help them”? Yeah, we know exactly what that extreme far-right nationalist fervour and moronic us-and-them name-calling leads to. Aussies were dying on the WWII battlefields to oppose that kind of politics. It’s awful to see Gilmore’s legacy degraded by such asinine comments.