♪ Peat Bog Soldiers ♪
Far and wide as the eye can wander,
Heath and bog are everywhere.
Not a bird sings out to cheer us.
Oaks are standing gaunt and bare.
We are the peat bog soldiers,
Marching with our spades to the moor.
The town of Richmond straddles the fast flowing River Swale.
The edge of the sweeping Yorkshire Dales.
The town was named Hindrelag when it was first founded and
has stood here for more than a thousand years.
The skyline is punctured by a commanding tower of
honey-coloured sandsone which cast its' shadow over the surrounding rooftops
This is the keep of Richmond Castle
100 feet tall with walls 11 feet thick.
Local legend has it that King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table
are sleeping in a cavern beneath the castle's rocky ruins.
Richmond Castle was built to make a statement
and it still makes a statement today.
It dominates the North Yorkshire town and more than 900 years ago it dominated
a huge tract of land called The Honor of Richmond.
Built in the 1070s this is a symbol of Normon control over the
North of England following the Harrying of the North a time
when William the Conqueror brutally put down the last of the English
resistance to Norman rule.
It commands superb views across the surrounding landscape
and is perhaps the best-preserved of all the early Norman castles in England.
Ruins have for a long time been a source of inspiration for writers and artists.
And Richmond is no exception.
With its lofty stone walls in its precipitous position overlooking
the River Swale
It's no surprise that countless artists have been drawn to Richmond Castle.
In the late 18th Century J M W Turner immortalised the drama
and romance of the battlements at sunrise in his
luminous watercolours.
Such is the beauty of the place that it's easy to forget that
this is a military structure at its core.
From the 19th Century the castle was the home to the local militia force
and during the First World War it housed a military prison.
This prison was only small - eight cells in total, but it
contains - it embodies - an incredibly powerful story of the human spirit
and resistance to authority.
It was here in 1916 that 16 men, later to become known as the
Richmond Sixteen were held.
They were conscientious objectors who refused to fight,
bare arms or contribute in any way to the war effort.
This could be for a number of reasons. It could be political
or it could be religious there was no one reason why these men
chose to take a stand against the war.
While they were held in the cells
some of them left the most remarkable record of their lives and their beliefs
in the form of graffiti on the cell walls.
There were drawings including a portrait of one of the prisoners' mother
Religious tracks and songs all preserved. An incredibly
fragile record of this remarkable story.
The Richmond Sixteen were eventually transferred to France
where they were court-martialed and sentenced to death by firing squad.
Although this was later commuted to ten years hard labour.
These men were willing to make the ultimate sacrifice
for their beliefs for their morals.
Their ability to maintain their strength when all the apparatus of the military
along with much of society, was ranged against them.
Is a remarkable human story.
And it's a story on a very human scale. But it's played out
here within the walls of an enormous monumental structure.
Peat Bog Soldiers, sung for us by Jimmy Uldridge and Sid Goldsmith
is the well-known political song about the Nazi camps
smuggled through the bars and out of prisons to become the
anthem it is today
A fine example of a song that kept people going within their cells
it links us back to the stories of the conscientious objectors
locked away in Richmond Castle, and reminds us
of the power and potency of prison song.
♪ Peat Bog Soldiers ♪ Up and down the guards are pacing,
No one, no one can get through.
Flight would mean a sure death facing,
Guns and barbed wire block our view.
We are the peat bog soldiers,
Marching with our spades to the moor.
But for us there is no complaining,
Winter will in time be past.
One day we shall rise rejoicing.
Homeland, dear, you're mine at last.
No more the peat bog soldiers
Will march with our spades
to the moor.