"Heart of Oak" is the official march of the Royal Navy. It is also the official march of several Commonwealth navies, including the Royal Canadian Navy and the Royal New Zealand Navy. It was the official march of the Royal Australian Navy, but has now been replaced by the new march, "Royal Australian Navy".[1]

The music of Heart of Oak was written in 1759 by composer William Boyce, the lyrics by actor David Garrick, for Garrick's pantomime Harlequin's Invasion, to which others contributed as well. The pantomime was first performed on New Year's Eve of that year at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London,[2] with Handel soloist Samuel Thomas Champnes singing Heart of Oak.

The "wonderful year" referenced in the first verse was the Annus Mirabilis of 1759, during which British forces were victorious in several significant battles: the Battle of Minden on 1 August 1759; the Battle of Lagos on 19 August 1759; the Battle of the Plains of Abraham (outside Quebec City) on 13 September 1759; and the Battle of Quiberon Bay on 20 November 1759. The last battle foiled a French invasion project planned by the Duc de Choiseul to defeat Britain during the Seven Years' War, hence the reference in the song to 'flat-bottom' invasion barges. These victories were followed a few months later by the Battle of Wandiwash in India on 22 January 1760. Britain's continued success in the war boosted the song's popularity.

The oak in the song's title refers to the wood from which British warships were generally made during the age of sail. The "Heart of oak" is the strongest central wood of the tree. The reference to "freemen not slaves" echoes the refrain ("Britons never will be slaves!") of Rule, Britannia!, written and composed two decades earlier.[3]

Lyrics

Original

The song was written for the London stage in 1759 by William Boyce with words by David Garrick:[4]

Come cheer up, my lads! 'tis to glory we steer,
To add something more to this wonderful year;
To honour we call you, as free men not slaves,
For who are so free as the sons of the waves?

Chorus:
Heart of oak are our ships, heart of oak are our men;
We always are ready, steady, boys, steady!
We'll fight and we'll conquer again and again.[5]

Amended Words

Come, cheer up, my lads, 'tis to glory we steer,
To add something new to this wonderful year;
To honour we call you, as freemen not slaves,
For who are so free as the sons of the waves?

Chorus:
Heart of Oak are our ships,
Jolly Tars are our men,
We always are ready: Steady, boys, Steady!
We'll fight and we'll conquer again and again.

We ne'er see our foes but we wish them to stay,
They never see us but they wish us away;
If they run, why we follow, and run them ashore,
For if they won't fight us, what can we do more?

(Chorus)

They say they'll invade us, these terrible foes,
They frighten our women, our children, our beaus,
But if they in their flat-bottoms, in darkness set oar,
Still Britons they'll find to receive them on shore.

(Chorus)

We still make them fear and we still make them flee,
And drub them ashore as we drub them at sea,
Then cheer up me lads with one heart let us sing,
Our soldiers and sailors, our statesmen and king.

(Chorus)

Alternative first verse:
Come, cheer up, my lads, 'tis to glory we steer,
With heads carried high, we will banish all fear;
To honour we call you, as freemen not slaves,
For who are so free as the sons of the waves?

Alternative last verse:
Britannia triumphant her ships rule the seas,
Her watchword is 'Justice' her password is 'Free',
So come cheer up my lads, with one heart let us sing,
Our soldiers, our sailors, our statesmen, our King [Queen].

Royal Canadian Navy

Come, cheer up, my lads, 'tis to glory we steer,
To add something new to this wonderful year;
To honour we call you, not press you like slaves,
For who are so free as the sons of the waves?

Chorus:
Heart of Oak are our ships,
Jolly Tars are our men,
We always are ready: Steady, boys, steady!
We'll fight and we'll conquer again and again.[6]

The first verse and chorus of this version of the song is heard in Star Trek: The Next Generation (Season 3, Episode 18 "Allegiance"), sung in Ten Forward by Patrick Stewart, in-character as an alien doppelgänger of Captain Jean-Luc Picard.[7] Both are also sung by Peter Ustinov and Dean Jones in the 1968 Disney movie Blackbeard's Ghost.[8]

New lyrics

A new version was presented on 16 April 1809 and published by Reverend Rylance.[9]

When Alfred, our King, drove the Dane from this land,
He planted an oak[10] with his own royal hand;
And he pray'd for Heaven's blessing to hallow the tree,
As a sceptre for England, the queen of the sea.

Chorus:

Heart of oak[11] are our ships,
Hearts of oak are our men,
We always are ready, steady boys, steady,
To charge and to conquer again and again.

The sapling shot up and stuck firm to the ground;
It defied every tempest that bellow'd around;
And still was it seen with fresh vigour to shoot,
When the blood of our martyrs had moisten'd its root.

(Chorus)

But the worms of corruption had eaten their way
Through its bark; till a Wardle[12] has swept them away,
He has sworn, no such reptiles our tree shall infest,
And our patriots soon shall extirpate the nest.

(Chorus)

Yon tyrant, whose rule abject Europe bemoans —
Yon brood of usurpers who sit on her thrones —
Shall look on our country, and tremble with awe,
Where a son of the Monarch has bow'd to the law,

(Chorus)

Now long live the Briton, who dar'd to revive
The spirit which Britons scarce felt was alive;
His name shall be carv'd, while of freedom we sing,
On the oak that was planted by Alfred our King.

(Chorus)

See also

References

  1. ↑ Royal Australian Navy, retrieved 30 November 2023
  2. ↑ John Ogasapian, Music of the Colonial and Revolutionary Era (Greenwood Publishing Group, 2004), 100-101. ISBN 0313324352, 9780313324352
  3. ↑ Brunsman, Denver (30 March 2013). The Evil Necessity: British Naval Impressment in the Eighteenth-century. Charlottesville, US: University of Virginia Press. ISBN 9780813933511.
  4. ↑ "March Marches on: Remembering the 104th Regiment of Foot". Daily Gleaner. 13 March 2018 – via ProQuest.
  5. ↑ Print Culture. Department of History, University of Warwick, 2007. Retrieved 17 December 2018
  6. ↑ The Naden Band of the Royal Canadian Navy, 03 May 2020. Retrieved 02 February 2023
  7. ↑ Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine: "Picard Singing in Ten Forward". YouTube.
  8. ↑ Archived at Ghostarchive: "Blackbeard's Ghost - Heart of Oak (English)". YouTube.
  9. ↑ Rylance, Reverence (1809). Spirit of the public Journals, vol. XIII, p. 75.
  10. ↑ The reference is to an oak which stood close to the Water Walk, the Magdalen College, Oxford, and by tradition was planted by King Alfred. However the oak collapsed in 1778 and a chair for the college President was made from it.
  11. ↑ Reference to the rift sawing of hardwoods used in boat and ship construction. This produces timber less susceptible to warping and shrinkage and lumber of great stability. Contemporary opinions were that the British sailors were more steady in combat than the French, who were prone to over-excitement and, therefore, more difficult to command in combat.
  12. ↑ The name Wardle is said to be derived from "Ward Hill", connoting a "fortified place", as a reference to the ship of the line, described as "wooden walls".
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