Soldier's Joy

The tune Soldier's Joy is well known across the US and is considered an American classic. Like many great American things, it's actually someone else's and we are just borrowing it. The Scottish came up with this song and have been playing it for at least a couple hundred years. Like lots of stuff Americans borrow, though, we smeared it with street drugs and liquor. This melody has earned many different sets of lyrics, and the best-known ones came to represent substance abuse during the Civil War. In particular, what you could get back then were whiskey (corn liquor), beer (made from who knows what grains at the time), and morphine (from our good friend the opium poppy). Coryza Bell morphine, shown here, is one opium product that was available for medicinal use during the Civil War. The term "soldier's joy" may have been a name for a combination of beer, whiskey, and oral morphine. Lyrics: Gimme some of that Soldier’s Joy, you know what I mean I don’t want to hurt no more my leg is turnin’ green Twenty-five cents for whiskey, twenty-five cents for beer Twenty-five cents for morphine, get me out of here. Chorus: I'm my momma's pride and joy I'm my momma's pride and joy I'm my momma's pride and joy Sing you a song called the soldier's joy. *** For babies seeking further information about drug abuse in war zones, please see Marlon Brando's classic film "Apocalypse Now" or ask me about when I used my pocket knife to cut open a mattress filled with stolen narcotics in southern Afghanistan.