SHOOTING FROM THE LIP murray williams Will we ‘walk this road together, through the storm’?

IN A HOTEL in Washington DC, at dawn, on Monday, November 18, 1861, a woman woke suddenly. Her name: Julia Ward Howe. Her husband, Samuel, a famed educator of the blind. They both led the fight against slavery.

She’d been processing words as she slept. She now sprang out of bed:

“I must get these verses down, lest I fall asleep again and forget them.

“I scrawled the verses almost without looking at the paper …”

The words were for a tune, sung by the 6th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry. She’d been asked to compose new lyrics, for “a fighting men’s song”.

And so as the sun rose over the capital of the United States of America, that Monday morning, the Battle Hymn of the Republic was born.

“Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;

“He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;

“He has loosed the fateful lightning of his terrible swift sword: “His truth is marching on.”

All together now …

The world now knows the chorus that follows.

The Battle Hymn became the rallying cry for the Union in the American Civil War, under Abraham Lincoln.

Union and “union” – upper case and lower case. For this is the president who famously warned: “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”

He implored all America to unite against slavery. His plea wasn’t heard, and America went to war with itself, “brother against brother”.

More than 620 000 men died. The Battle Hymn has united many, ever since 1861. Winston Churchill asked it be played at his funeral.

The danger of most rousing anthems, of course, is their rapid descent into war propaganda.

Wilfred Owen burst that bubble with his poem Dulce et Decorum Est. He told the horrific truths about war – exposing the lie that it’s “sweet and honourable to die for one’s country”.

But the Battle Hymn was unique – a “fighting men’s song”, yes. But born of a call for unity. How rare is that.

Like today, 160 years later, in another republic – South Africa?

What do we sing, when we march or run together?

Words like this, by the rapper Eminem:

“I’m not afraid to take a stand; “Everybody come take my hand;

“We’ll walk this road together, through the storm;

“Whatever weather, cold or warm;

“Just let you know that, you’re not alone.”

Do we sing with one voice, about anything?

Unite with common purpose, determined to find our “glory”? No.

Perhaps …

Perhaps, we need a new song. A battle hymn.

For union.