Fiddler's Green

12B supporting Cav scouts and A1s with Brads. My Order of the Spurs is one of my most admired pieces of my military history. Along with a Meritorious Mast from the USMC.

MAJ (Join to see) Sounds like you bleed red and white too!

If you support Cav, you're Cav SFC Michael Hartwig !

The Scouts gave us an early Christmas Present as well. They had the back of their Bradley full of c4 and initiators but didn't know how to use it. Plussed us up big time. We started BIPing everything that looked weird.

SFC Mark Merino That makes 2 of us! The 11th ACR lost a great leader this past week. LTC Kelly Hodge. An energetic Cavalry 2LT back in the mid 80s in 1st Squadron. He was mad as hell when he got assigned as a Tank Plt Ldr instead of a Scout Plt Ldr. He was given an awesome Cav send off. There is plenty of drink going on on the Green this week. RIP Kelly Hodge!

"Once Cav, Always Cav" Even in the after life of the Army, still Cav!!!! :-)

[Verse 1]

Halfway down the trail to Hell
In a shady meadow green
Are the Souls of all dead Troopers camped
Near a good old-time canteen,
And this eternal resting place is
know as Fiddlers' Green

[Verse 2]

Marching past straight through to Hell
The Infantry are seen
Accompanied by the Engineers,
Artillery and Marines,
For none but the shades of Cavalrymen
Dismount at Fiddlers' Green

[Verse 3]

Though some go curving down the trail
To seek a warmer scene,
No Trooper ever gets to Hell
Ere he's emptied his canteen.
And so rides back to drink again
With friends at Fiddlers' Green

[Verse 4]

And so when man and horse go down
Beneath a sabre keen,
Or on roaring charge of fierce melee
You stop a bullet clean.
And the hostiles come to get your scalp
Just empty your canteen,
And put your pistol to your head
And go to Fiddlers' Green.

Many believe that the origin and author of Fiddler's Green may have originated by the 5th Royal Irish Lancers who trace their origin back to 1689 when a cavalry formation known as Wynne's Regiment of Enniskillen Dragoons was formed by the then governor James Wynne. Although there no evidence that the Irish Lancers appropriated the paradise and incorporated it into a poem that emigrated to the US with its members, or whether the paradise and poem are of US origin.

The cavalry paradise reference seems to be associated with the 7th US Cavalry from the post Civil War era and the Indian Wars period (circa 1860-1870). Now, there is a link between the 7th US Cavalry and Ireland. Many troopers of the 7th Cavalry were of Irish origin, and the 7th Cavalry's own insignia has the phrase "Garryowen" on it. "Garryowen" is a derivative of the Irish Gaelic Garraí Eóin which means Owen's Garden. Owen's Garden was a commons (open field) in Limerick, Ireland that gave rise to a drinking ballad of the same name. The 5th Royal Irish Lances, an Irish cavalry unit, used that drinking ballad.

Thanks SGM Jeff Bullard excellent additions to the discussion.

SGM Jeff Bullard Today I came across this Thread for the first time. Thank you for presenting the connection between our Cavalry and Irish History together here. It's not well known by many (unless you're Cavalry) and CMDCM Gene Treants with the Naval connection. A refreshing read. Thank You! ALLONS!

Below is more info showing the connection between Fiddler's Green throughout the different Branches of Service.

The story of Fiddler's Green was published in 1923, in Cavalry Journal.[6] According to this article, it was inspired by a story told by Captain "Sammy" Pearson at a campfire in the Medicine Bow Mountains of Wyoming. It is still used by modern cavalry units to memorialize the deceased. The name has had other military uses. Today, in the heart of the Helmand River Valley, in Helmand Province, Afghanistan, the U.S. Marine Corps operates a firebase (FB) named Fiddler's Green. Fiddler’s Green was an artillery Fire Support Base in Military Region III in Vietnam in 1972 occupied principally by elements of 2nd Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry, and also was the name of the U.S. Navy's enlisted men's club in Sasebo, Japan from 1952 to 1976. The Cavalry man's poem regarding Fiddler's Green is also the regimental poem of the US 2nd Cavalry Regiment.
It was the name of the enlisted men's club at Bainbridge Naval Training Center. The informal bar at the Fort Sill Officers' Open Mess used to be known as Fiddler's Green and it is the name of the stable and pasture used by Parsons Mounted Cavalry, a cadet group at Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas, and that of the bar at the Leaders Club in Fort Knox, Kentucky. Building 2805, which used to be the O-club, on Fort Hood, Texas is called Fiddler's Green. There is also a small E-club on Camp Pendleton in area 43 (Las Pulgas) named for it. The base pub at the Joint Forces Training Base, Los Alamitos, CA is called Fiddler's Green.