Musicians have long drawn inspiration from armed conflict. Scotland’s the Sensational Alex Harvey Band addressed the American Revolution in its 1976 hit “Boston Tea Party”, for example, while Paul Kennerley’s White Mansions (1978) employed the likes of Steve Cash and John Dillon (both from the Ozark Mountain Daredevils), Jessi Colter, and Waylon Jennings to musically portray the lives of Southerners during the Civil War. In 2021, famed bluegrass banjoist Tony Trischka released his own Civil War concept album called Shall We Hope.
It’s Vietnam, however, that has provided contemporary popular music with its most prolific and fertile wartime material. Justin Brummer, founding editor of the Vietnam War Song Project, has indexed approximately 5,000 songs that explore the conflict. Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Fortunate Son” and “Ohio” by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young are two notable examples, as is the Charlie Daniels Band’s “Still in Saigon”, a unique look at a veteran returning from war (“The ground at home was covered with snow/ And I was covered with sweat/ My younger brother calls me a killer/ And my daddy calls me a vet”).
Perhaps no moment from the Vietnam War has stirred the emotions of songwriters more than the My Lai Massacre (Brummer’s research has tracked almost 100 songs that specifically reference the incident). The tragic story of the slaughter at My Lai is one of the most horrific events of the entire conflict: On 16 March 1968, on orders given by Lt. William Calley, American troops opened fire in the hamlet of My Lai in South Vietnam. Estimates vary, but between some 350 and 500 unarmed civilians (including women, children, and elderly men) were slaughtered.
Musicians were quick to condemn the incident. Folk singer Thom Parrott graphically recounted the horror of the tragedy in his song “Pinkville Helicopter” (Pinkville was the military map name for My Lai): “The things that we’ve seen up in Pinkville today/ Well, we won’t even try to describe them/ But this wasn’t war, it was a pack of mad dogs/ Just killing to see people dying”). However, not everyone agreed with Parrott’s denouncement, suggesting a widening divide in how American citizens viewed the war.
“Battle Hymn of Lt. Calley” is a fictional, largely spoken-word first-person narrative that defends Lt. William Calley’s leadership at My Lai. Composed by James M. Smith and Julian Wilson and released in March 1971, the song was recorded by disc jockey and Alabama native Terry Nelson and a group of studio musicians known as C Company (C Company — or Charlie Company — was the name of the army unit serving under Calley’s command at My Lai). “Battle Hymn of Lt. Calley” is shocking, given what we know about the incident.
Set to “Battle Hymn of the Republic”, originally written by Julia Ward Howe during the Civil War, “Battle Hymn of Lt. Calley” is told from Calley’s perspective in an attempt to justify his actions:
Sir, I followed all my orders and I did the best I could
It’s hard to judge the enemy and hard to tell the good
Yet there’s not a man among us would not have understood
We took the jungle village exactly like they said
We responded to their rifle fire with everything we had
And when the smoke had cleared away a hundred souls lay dead
Sir, the soldier that’s alive is the only one can fight
There’s no other way to wage a war when the only one in sight
That you’re sure is not a VC is your buddy on your right
When all the wars are over and the battle’s finally won
Count me only as a soldier who never left his gun
With the right to serve my country as the only prize I’ve won
Glory, glory hallelujah, glory, glory hallelujah, glory, glory hallelujah
As we go marching on, as we go marching on
Perhaps more startling than the song itself was the public’s reaction; the song hit both Billboard’s pop and country charts (peaking at Nos. 37 and 49, respectively). In fact, in April 1971, a month after its release, “Battle Hymn of Lt. Calley” was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (awarded for sales of one million copies). Terry Nelson and C Company’s accompanying full-length album expands on the retelling of Calley’s story by exploring America’s role in military engagements one war at a time.
Patriotic War Propaganda Goes Country
First released on Plantation Records in 1971, Wake Up America includes 11 highly patriotic war-themed country songs. Its cover art reveals the concept: crude, comic-book-style drawings of soldiers representing the various wars in which the United States has fought, including the War of 1812, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War.
Although the centerpiece of the album is “Battle Hymn of Lt. Calley”, it’s not the only pro-Vietnam War song. Take “When the Great Men Signed Their Names”, for example:
In places such as Vietnam
My men now have to fight
To show the world that we still believe
In freedom’s light
And if a man must die
It will not be in vain
But for the liberty we had
Since the great men signed their names
“Routine Patrol” — the B-side to the “Battle Hymn of Lt. Calley” single — is another Vietnam-related song. This somber, somewhat haunting spoken-word number is presented from a soldier’s point of view and provides a detailed account of the dangers of wartime patrol (“If I ever get back/ I’d swear to my soul/ I’ll never go again/ On routine patrol”).
The album twice addresses the Civil War from the perspective of the Confederacy. “Johnny Reb” is a cover of the 1959 Johnny Horton song, for instance, while “Mr. Sherman’s Army” is the story of a Confederate soldier trying to escape General William Tecumseh Sherman’s 1864 march through Georgia:
Mr. Sherman’s army
Is coming after me
They took me out of Georgia, Lord
To fight in Tennessee
Now, all those Georgia peach trees
And old Atlanta town
Will never be the same
Mr. Sherman burned ’em down
The record also considers other armed conflicts, including the Spanish-American War (“Buffalo Soldiers”), World War I (“Till We Bring Our Johnnies Home Again”), and World War II and the Korean War (“War Baby”). There is also a song called “The Star Spangled Ballad”, a tribute to Francis Scott Key, who in September 1814 wrote the lyrics to “The Star-Spangled Banner”.
Wake Up America ends appropriately with a reworked version of the traditional folk song “Yankee Doodle Dandy”. “And every time a fighting man takes a stand, you know/ We ought to play another verse, play it loud and slow,” sings Nelson. “For history can repeat and like he went to town/ We ought to thank our fighting men, Lord, don’t let ’em down.”
Aftermath of a Tragedy and a Songwriter Is Born
Lt. William Calley was convicted and sentenced to life in prison on 29 March 1971, after being found guilty of the premeditated murder of 22 unarmed South Vietnamese civilians. After a lengthy series of appeals and legal proceedings, he was paroled on 19 November 1974. Calley lived the rest of his life in relative anonymity; he died aged 80 in 2024.
Despite its initial success, “Battle Hymn of Lt. Calley” quickly faded from view. The public grew wary of the growing death toll in Vietnam, and defending Calley and his actions at My Lai became harder to justify. Terry Nelson and C Company never recorded again.
Time hasn’t been kind to Wake Up America. The album’s patriotic war propaganda seems odd and out of touch today. Nelson’s singing is limited (possibly the reason for so many spoken word bits), the playing is amateurish, and most of the album’s short, country-flavored compositions are rudimentary at best. As of 2026, the album has never been reissued on LP or CD.
Terry Nelson — also known as Terry Nelson Skinner — found new life after “Battle Hymn of Lt. Calley”. He played in a short-lived, one-record band called Bama but ultimately scored more success as a songwriter. He co-wrote both “Touch Me When We’re Dancing” (a Top 20 pop hit for the Carpenters in 1981 and a 1986 No. 1 country song for Alabama) and Air Supply’s “Even the Nights Are Better”, a Top 5 song in 1982. Nelson was inducted into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame in 1995; he died in 2014 at the age of 71.
Resources
Cori Brosnahan. “Music of My Lai”. American Experience. March 2018.
Howard Jones. My Lai: Vietnam, 1968 and the Descent into Darkness. Oxford University Press. 2017.