Red. White and Blue Socks - Poem

Leaves from the battlefield of Gettysburg: a series of letters from a field hospital; and national poems, 1864

By Emily Bliss Thacher Souder, Mrs. Edmund A. Souder

Pg. 93

Knitting for the Army.

Inscribed to a lady of Christ Church.

All honor to the noble dame,

            Of fourscore years and seven;

To loyal heart and willing hand,

            Let honor due be given.

While youth and health the needles ply,

            And knit the livelong day,

We look with loving pride on her

            Who soon must pass away,

Yet wearies not, in hour of need,

            When faithful sons for country bleed,

To guard their feet from winter’s cold,

            Thus comforting the soldier bold.

Six pairs of hose, her busy hands

            Have hastened to prepare;

A happy soldier must he be,

            Whose feet these good socks wear.

The colors of our country’s flag

            They also bring to view,

And heart and eye alike are cheered

            With the red, white and blue;

So soft and warm and smoothly knit,

            A soldier’s foot they well will fit;

Grateful must prove the favored one,

            When told whose hands the works has done.

Another charm the soft wool holds,--

            Let me the secret tell:

Three times, the loyal thirty-four

            Within the circle dwell.

A stitch for every silver star—

            Woe to the hand that seeks to mar

The flag that floats o’er land and sea,

            Emblem, my country dear, of thee!

Withered the arm of every foe

            That aims at thee a deadly blow;

Palsied the traitor’s serpent tongue,

            Poisoning the fountain whence he sprung!