Convoy Rolling

 

Grady McMurtry

 

4 April 1944

 

 

Along a winding city street

The dusty convoys roll,

Across the downs a laden fleet

Is roaring to its goal;

We’re hauling bombs that will defeat

The Hun; we take our toll.

 

The boys who roll bomb laden trucks

Through blinding English fog

Or claw their way in six wheel drive

Across the Burma bog

With nothing for protection

From the strafing bombers’ dive

Are just as much our heroes

As the boys who lead the drive.

 

Have we ever tasted battle?

Do we lose our share of men?

Our dead line Stuka Valley

On the road to Kasserine!

 

Do we stop for mud or mountain?

Do we need the Engineers?

We build our road and flat-top

Where there are no Hairy Ears!

 

What if the map is hopeless

And the fog as grey as slate?

We roll those trucks on schedule

For the Bomber Boys can’t wait!

 

It takes more than being reckless,

It takes more than gift of gab,

When there’s five tons of explosive

Riding right behind the cab

 

And that box of fuses sitting

Right beside you on the seat;

But “Operations” doesn’t give

Its medals to this fleet!

 

So we do our job in silence

Giving service to the line,

We roll by day, we roll by night,

We roll come rain or shine

 

And when the road’s a target?

Rack’er back and let’er buck!

Through hell and high explosive

Rolls the Quartermaster Truck!

 

Then when we’re through to “Bomber”

We can stop and take a rest,

Behind the wheel as like as not—

May “Operations” be unblessed!

 

And we dream of trucker’s heaven

Where the wheeling convoys roll

On paving blocks of marble,

Where there is no mud or toll

 

Where the Jerry planes are never

And the highway’s broad and straight,

Just dynamite that throttle

And we’ll highball through the gate!

 

Till we wake to hit the trailway

And shuttle back for more,

Ours is a job that’s never done;

Until the war is o’er

We’re in there rolling with the punch—

The Quartermaster Corps!

 

 

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