Lambert Murphy - Roses of Picardy (1917)

Roses of Picardy
Words by Fred E. Weatherly, Music by Haydn Wood
Lambert Murphy, tenor and orchestra
Recorded December 24, 1917
Victor 45150

Some of the most intense fighting in World War I occurred in the Picardy region of France, reflected in the melancholy English popular song "Roses of Picardy" (1916) and also in the large number of cemeteries that mark former battlefields in the Somme valley. Picardy was also the scene of bitter fighting in World War II—in May 1940 and August and September 1944.

(The following is from the January 18, 1919 issue of "The Music Trades")
Fred Weatherly, composer of the words, struck a chord in every heart when he penned the lines of a song that spoke of the roses that shine in Picardy, just at a time when the fiercest battle the world has ever known was being fought on the plains of Picardy. It was indeed a wholesome thought that despite the greatest congregation of artillery, together with shells and all the terrific paraphernalia of war, the Roses would again bloom in Picardy. The sublime faith bound up in the simple strains of a ballad naturally took hold of the people of England, and as our own brave boys came back from the battle-torn plains of Picardy, they too will enjoy with special significance the simple expression of so sublime a thought in song.