Pete Seeger’s Best Song

Communists recorded this, then wished they hadn’t.

“The Ballad of October 16th” recorded by the Almanac Singers (written by Millard Lampell) was released on Songs for John Doe in May 1941, featuring Pete Seeger on banjo. At that time Communists like Seeger were opposed to American intervention in the European war.

Evidently they believed that the situation in Europe as of early 1941, with France subjugated and mostly disarmed, and British forces driven from the continent but still fighting Germany on the sea and in North Africa, was a situation that worked in favor of the Soviet Union, with its massive quantitative superiority over Germany. It is evident in Stalin’s behavior at the time that he regarded Germany’s situation as highly vulnerable, to the point of trying to force enormous concessions out of Germany in return for continuing Soviet “friendship.” Heinrich Haertle describes the situation:

Molotov’s November 1940 extortion attempt in Berlin already practically signaled Stalin’s determination for war. He was pressuring Germany, which was still at war with England and already in a de facto war with the United States, to hand over to the Soviet Union the Balkans, the Baltic Sea, and above all the war-deciding oil supply in Romania, thereby making it clear that he would stab Germany in the back at the first opportunity. [Heinrich Haertle, 1965]

The month after Songs for John Doe was released, Operation Barbarossa commenced and the Red Army — arrayed for attack, not defense — was sent reeling, forced into a chaotic retreat. Thereupon Communists worldwide did an abrupt and highly revealing about-face: Seeger and other Communist pseudo-folksingers switched from anti-war songs to pro-war songs. Copies of this recording not yet sold were recalled and destroyed.

It was on a Saturday night and the moon was shining bright;
They passed the Conscription Bill.
And the people they did say, for many miles away,
‘Twas the President and his boys on Capitol Hill.

Oh Franklin Roosevelt told the people how he felt.
We damned near believed what he said!
He said, “I hate war, and so does Eleanor,
But we won’t be safe till everybody’s dead.”

When my poor old mother died, I was sitting by her side.
A-promising to war I’d never go.
But now I’m wearin’ khaki jeans, and eatin’ army beans,
And I’m told that J.P. Morgan loves me so!

I have wandered over this land, a roamin’ workin’ man,
No clothes to wear and not much food to eat,
But now the government foots the bill, gives me clothes and feeds me swill,
Gets me shot and puts me underground six feet!

Oh Franklin Roosevelt told the people how he felt.
We damned near believed what he said!
He said, “I hate war, and so does Eleanor,
But we won’t be safe till everybody’s dead.”

Why, nothing can be wrong, if it makes our country strong.
We’ve gotta get tough to save democracy!
And though it may mean war, we must defend Singapore;
This don’t hurt you half as much as it hurts me.

Oh Franklin Roosevelt told the people how he felt.
We damned near believed what he said!
He said, “I hate war, and so does Eleanor,
But we won’t be safe till everybody’s dead.”

Here’s another song from Songs for John Doe,”Washington Breakdown,” written by Pete Seeger and Lee Hays, to the tune of “Ida Red”: