Posted on 12/31/2010 5:48:24 PM PST by Germanicus Cretorian
LYRICS:
He was just a rookie trooper and he surely shook with fright. He checked off his equipment and made sure his pack was tight. He had to sit and listen to those awful engines roar. You ain't gonna jump no more.
Chorus: Gory, gory, what a hell of way to die. Gory, gory, what a hell of way to die. Gory, gory, what a hell of way to die. He ain't gonna jump no more.
"Is everybody happy?" cried the sergeant looking up. Our hero feebly answered, "Yes", and then they stood him up. He jumped into the icy blast, his static line unhooked. And he ain't gonna jump no more.
He counted long, he counted loud, he waited for the shock. He felt the wind, he felt the cold, he felt the awful drop. The silk from his reserve spilled out and wrapped around his legs. And he ain't gonna jump no more.
The risers swung around his neck, connectors cracked his dome. Suspension lines were tied in knots around his skinny bones. The canopy became his shroud, he hurtled to the ground. And he ain't gonna jump no more.
The days he lived and loved and laughed kept running through his mind. He thought about the girl back home, the one he left behind. He thought about the medicos and wondered what they'd find. And he ain't gonna jump no more.
The ambulance was on the spot, the jeeps were running wild. The medics jumped and screamed with glee, rolled up their sleeves and smiled. For it had been a week or more since last a 'chute had failed And he ain't gonna jump no more.
He hit the ground, the sound was "Splat," his blood went spurting high. His comrades they were heard to say, "A helluva way to die." He lay there rolling 'round in the welter of his gore. And he ain't gonna jump no more.
There was blood upon the risers, there were brains upon the 'chute. Intestines were a-dangling from his paratrooper suit. He was a mess, they picked him up and poured him from his boots. And he ain't gonna jump no more.
First used in 1884!
Thanks, couldn’t find the definition anywhere.
I'm anispeptic, frasmotic, even compunctuous to have caused you such pericombobulation.
IT's all good. = )
Perhaps because many of us do not know it as crap, but as a great airborne song that we all know by heart. Those who think it crap cannot begin to understand why we like it.
I always preferred *Beautiful Streamer* meself. But that's an acquired taste, acquired from the old days of the 11th Airborne Division in the late 1950s, where it was the unofficial division tune.
Plus the 7th Army Airborne Delivery Test Group and the 10th Special Forces Group in the mid-'60s. 388 jumps before I ended that sort of thing for good. I think.
Beautiful streamer, open for me,
Blue skies above me and no canopy;
Counted nine thousands, counted too long,
Reached for the rip cord, the damn thing was gone.
Beautiful streamer, why must it be?
White silk above me is what I should see,
Just like my mother that looks over me;
To hell with the rip cord, ‘twas not made for me.
Beautiful streamer, follow me down,
Time is elapsing and here comes the ground;
Six hundred feet and then I can tell,
If I’ll go to heaven or end up in hell.
Beautiful streamer, this is the end,
Gabriel is blowing, my body won’t mend;
All you jump happy son’s of a gun,
Take this last warning as jumping’s no fun.
Another piece of crap to the uninitiated, I suppose. All of the Old Timers said that the 11th was the hardcore of the airborne divisions, gone by my day (not counting the 11th Air Assault Division).
Airborne New Year to you.
Your poem, in memory of SGT Joseph OBrien, First Special Service Force (Canada)
Among the hardcore of the 11th were many WWII and Korean War airborne veterans- not all of them on the U.S. Side. We had quite a few *Lodge Act* foreign volunteers, some former German *Green Devils* as well as some former French Para and Foreign Legion types who saw what was coming in Algeria and got out as their enlistments terminated and took their skills elsewhere. Quite a few moved on into 10th Group with a reenlistment, others who qualified for US citizenship took it and some of those went to civvy street and others re-upped.
In my long years of existence I have, upon occasion, become intoxicated by the exuberance of own verbosity. Thus I question others.
verily
:-) Ah. The good old days.
I was at a REFORGER fess tent and saw the German paras and US paras fight off the Brits and Aussies amongst the rafters of the tent. They were trying to post their colors on the highest shackle.
And if you have to ask about REFORGER, don’t.
And I still think the Ballad of the Green Berets is the best, bar none.
“Straight leg straight leg standing in the door, got so scared he -— on the floor.”
Co.B/75 Ranger Airborne.
Hey — Don’t mean nothin!— some memories is memories some remind us of what ought be expected thanks to a Congress divorced from the Founding Principles of Religion and Morality.
(504th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment)
I never served, but was a firefighter and I agree. We could
get pretty raw with our humor. It probably would have shocked those outside of our fraternity. Never knew a bunch
that cared more about people and each other tho.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.