The Soldier's Life

BattleTechnology, Issue #0201

The Soldier's Life is a song that featured in BattleTechnology, Issue #0201. It has its origins in a folk song from nineteenth-century Terra, "Botany Bay", which was a song about the journey and hopes of Irish emigrants to Australia. This version is dateable to at least the late 2700s, given its optimistic or “naïve” view of a new soldier it stands to reason that this was before the heaviest fighting in the First Succession War. Responses to this song by seasoned warriors are typically negative.

Lyrics[edit]

Farewell to your bricks and mortar, farewell to your dirty lies.

Farewell to your gangers and gangplanks, and to hell with your overtime.

For the dropship Ragamuffin is liftin’ off today.

Gonna leave this life, my home and wife, and draw a MechWarriors pay.


I’d heard tales of a soldier’s life, of adventure and of gold.

They’ve got a girl on every world, or so I have been told.

Their best friend is their BattleMech, their fighting skill their fame;

I knew right then I’d go with them and make myself a name.


[Chorus]


The sergeant he came down the line, he looked at us and swore;

That a sorrier bunch of ‘Mech trainees, he’d never seen before.

He said we’d never make it, that we might as well go home.

Worked day and night, with all our might, by God we proved him wrong.


[Chorus]


Got posted to a garrison along the Draconis line.

We beat their regulars once or twice, their mercs a dozen times.

Now what they say about soldiering, tis true as true can be-;

Every job’s an adventure along the glory road, it’s a soldier’s life for me.


Lyrics by Thomas S. Gressman, song is sung to the tune of "Botany Bay"

Bibliography[edit]