First World War.com - Vintage Audio - Stony Broke In No Man's Land

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Canadian lights German prisoner's cigarette, Passchendaele, Nov, 1917 Vintage Audio: Stony Broke In No Man's Land
Updated - Sunday, 8 December, 2002

Reproduced below are the lyrics to the popular anonymous wartime song, Stony Broke In No Man's Land, also commonly referred to as British Soldier's Discharge Song.

Click here to listen to a post-war rendition of the song performed by Frank Miller in 1921 (MP3 format 744kb)

Stony Broke In No Man's Land

In 1914 a hundred year's ago it seems
When first the world was awakened from its peaceful dream
The bugle called I went away
They said I was a man then
But ah what can I do today

I can't get the old job can't get the new
Can't carry on as I used to do
I look around me and daily I see
Thousands and thousands of fellows
A lot worse off than me

In Piccadilly friends pass me by
I'm absolutely stranded in the Strand
But I confess I was contented more or less
When I was stony broke in No Man's Land

When the fighting was at its fiercest
And everything looked black
This is the promise that cheered us up:
"You'll get the old job back!"

When we crossed shell-swept No Man's Land
Through poison gas attacks
This promise heard:
"If you are scared you'll get the old job back!"

We were not professional soldiers
Fighting was not our game
We were only peaceful citizens
But we fought just the same

We sacrificed our wives and kids and homes
To do our bit
And now the door is closed to us
It seems hard to admit:

I can't get the old job
Can't get a new
Can't carry on as I used to do
I look around me, and daily I see
A lot worse off than me

In Piccadilly friends pass me by
I'm absolutely stranded in the Strand
But I confess I was contented more or less
When I was stony broke in No Man's Land

"Suicide Ditch" was a term used by British soldiers to refer to the front-line trench.