It's A Long Way to St John's
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On October 4, 1914, the S.S. Florizel sailed from St. John\'s for Europe carrying 500 Newfoundlers to fight in the Great War.\\xa0 They were joined over the next nine months by a thousand more.\\xa0 Almost all were young men.\\xa0 Few had any military experience; few had ever traveled far from home.\\xa0 They had lived intensely local lives in St. John\'s and in tight-knight largely rural fishing communities scattered all around the Newfoundland shore.\\xa0 Known as the Blue Puttees from the improvised blue woolen material used to fashion their legwear, the regiment arrived in Gallipoli in August 1915.\\xa0 In a brutal battle made famous in a song by Eric Bogle\'s haunting "And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda," 43 Newfoundlanders perished.\\xa0 Close to a year later, the Blue Puttees arrived in the Somme.\\xa0 On July 1, 1916, some 776 Newfoundlanders were ordered to attack at close quarters a much better equipped German Division.\\xa0 Only 68 answered the roll call the following morning.\\xa0 It was a carnage that is seared into Newfoundland memory and identity, making something of a coming of age and a loss of innocence.\\xa0 Danny O\'Flaherty captures the essence of this human tragedy in twelve beautifully composed and richly evocative songs from the war.\\xa0 They stand as a memorial not just to the fallen but to mothers, wives, children, sweethearts, families, and friends left behind.\\xa0 They are songs of sacrifice, of love and appalling loss.
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