Julia Ward Howe (1819-1910) was anguished over the fighting in the American Civil War. One day as she was watching a review of the Northern army, she heard the singing of the song “John Brown’s Body.” A song about a man who had been hanged in his efforts to free the slaves. She realized that the catchy tune needed better words. From her hotel room she could see the fires of “a hundred circling camps” and her mind thought about the “trumpet that shall never call retreat.” That day she penned the words to the hymn, the “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Even though Mrs. Howe followed the Unitarian and Transcendentalist beliefs, those teachings do not come through in the hymn and the hymn is considered one of America’s finest patriotic songs. It was once sung at a rally where President Abraham Lincoln was in attendance. After the loud applause, the President, with tears in his eyes, cried out, “Sing it again!”

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 Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword;
His truth is marching on.

refrain:
Glory, glory Hallelujah! Glory, glory Hallelujah!
Glory, glory Hallelujah! His truth is marching on.

I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps;
They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps;
His day is marching on.

I have read a fiery gospel. writ in burnished rows of steel;
“As ye deal with My contemners, so with you My grace shall deal”;
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with His heel;
Since God is marching on.

He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment seat;
O be swift, my soul, to answer Him! be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me;
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,
While God is marching on.

He is coming like the glory of the morning on the wave,
He is wisdom to the mighty, He is honor to the brave;
So the world shall be His footstool, and the soul of wrong His slave,
Our God is marching on.

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