The lives of these hardy people who fought and labored in the early days of Pittsburgh and Fort Pitt were certainly not untouched by poetry, loneliness and romance. Again, Bob Schmertz, touching his hand to the new Fort Pitt which was built on the ruins of Fort Duquesne by General Forbes in 1759, gives us a strangely haunting love song. The five bastions of the Fort, the Grenadier, Ohio, Monongahela, Flag and Music bastion give structure to his ballad; his delicate melody and poetry lend a truly enchanted quality to this moment from our past.

Vivien Richman

Listen to a Schmertz clip (at Smithsonian Folkways site)

The Fort has bastions five, the Grenadier is one.
It towers above the drawbridge moat
Toward the morning sun.
Upon the rampart high, a sentry stands alone,
Looks toward the England he’ll not see
Before his life is done.

REFRAIN:
Oh, lonely Grenadier, oh come and walk with me,
And see the tender burgeoning of each young leafy tree
New planted in the garden of the King’s Artillery.

Ohio bastion’s two, Monongahela’s three,
They guard the merging rivers flowing
Swiftly to the sea -
There is no gallant ship a-sail for London Town
So walk with me at sunset gun
And watch the flag go down.

REFRAIN:
Oh, lonely Grenadier, oh come and walk with me
Where columbine and marigold invite the vagrant bee
Philand’ring in the garden of the King’s Artillery.

The Flag is bastion four, the one called Music’s five
Each Battlement trumpet sound
Come echoing alive
The lonely sentry stands touched red by evening sun
And I would hold him in my arms
Before his life is done.

REFRAIN:
Oh, lonely Grenadier, oh come and walk with me
For we have yet a little time to gather, like the bee,
Sweet honey in the garden of the King’s Artillery.