I Was Only 19

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John Schumann

John Lewis Schumann (born May 1953) is an Australian singer, songwriter and guitarist from Adelaide. He is best known as the lead singer for the folk group Redgum, with their chart-topping hit "I Was Only 19 (A Walk in the Light Green)", a song exploring the psychological and medical side-effects of serving in the Australian forces during the Vietnam War. The song's sales assisted Vietnam Veterans during the 1983 Royal Commission into the effects of Agent Orange and other chemical defoliants employed during the war. Schumann was an Australian Democrats candidate in the 1998 Federal election, narrowly failing to unseat Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer for the Division of Mayo. more »

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Me and Mum and Dad, we saw the passing out parade at Puckapunyal, 
(it was long march from cadets). 
The Sixth Battalion was the next to tour and it was he who drew the card 
They did Canungra and Shoalwater before they left.

And Townsville lined the footpath as they marched down to the quay 
This clipping from the paper shows them young and strong and clean 
And that's him in his slouch hat, with his SLR and greens 
God help him, he was only nineteen.

From Vung Tau riding Chinooks to the dust at Nui Dat, 
I'd been in and out of choppers now for months. 
But we made our tents a home, VB and pin-ups on the lockers, 
and an Asian orange sunset through the scrub.
 
And can you tell me, doctor, why I still can't get to sleep? 
And night time's just a jungle dark and a barking M16? 
And what's this rash that comes and goes, can you tell me what it means?
God help me, I was only nineteen.

A four week operation, when each step could mean your last one on two legs:
it was a war within yourself. 
But you wouldn't let your mates down 'til they had you dusted off, 
so you closed your eyes and thought about something else.

Then someone yelled out "Contact"', and the bloke behind me swore. 
We hooked in there for hours, then a God almighty roar 
Frankie kicked a mine the day that mankind kicked the moon

God help me, he was going home in June.

1 can still see Frankie, drinking tinnies in the Grand Hotel 
on a thirty-six hour rec. leave in Vung Tau. 
And I can still hear Frankie lying screaming in the jungle. 
'Till the morphine came and killed the bloody row

 And the Anzac legends didn't mention mud and blood and tears, 
and stories that our father told us never seemed quite real
I caught some pieces in my back that I didn't even feel 
God help me, I was only nineteen.

And can you tell me, doctor, why I still can't get to sleep?
And why the Channel Seven chopper chills me to my feet? 
And what's this rash that comes and goes, can you tell me what it means? 
God help me, I was only nineteen.

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