The New Recruit / Fare Thee Well, Ye Sweethearts

Recruitment was a constant problem for the Continental Army after the disastrous campaign of 1776. Drink and song helped facilitate the process, especially when recruiters appeared at taverns or other public places. It is easy to imagine this song being sung on such an occasion. Like other popular songs, recruitment songs appeared in countless variations. The lyrics below were printed under the title “The New Recruit, or the Gallant Volunteer, A New Song” in a colonial newspaper; the recorded version uses the title “Fare Thee Well, Ye Sweethearts” and has fewer stanzas.

Come on my hearts of tempered steel,

And leave your girls and farms,

Your sports and plays and holidays,

And hark, away to arms!

And to conquest we will go, will go, will go,

And to conquest we will go.

A Soldier is a gentleman,

His honour is his life,

And he that won’t stand to his post,

Will never stand by his wife,

And to conquest we will go, &c.

For love and honour are the same,

Or else so near an ally,

That neither can exist alone,

But flourish side by side.

And to conquest we will go, &c.

So fare you well sweethearts a while,

You smiling girls adieu;

And when we drub the dogs away,

We kiss it out with you.

And to conquest we will go, &c.

The spring is up, the winter flies,

The hills are green and gay,

And all inviting honour calls,

Away, my boys, away.

And to conquest we will go, &c.

In shady tents, by cooling streams,

With hearts all firm and free,

We chase the cares of life away,

In songs of liberty.

And to conquest we will go, &c.

No foreign slaves shall give us law,

No British tyrants reign;

’Tis Independence made us free;

And freedom we maintain.

And to conquest we will go, &c.

We charge the foe from post to post,

Attack their works and lines,

Or by some well laid stratagem,

We make them all Burgoynes.

And to conquest we will go, &c.
And when the war is over, boys,

Then down we sit at ease,

And plow and sow and reap and mow,

And live just as we please.

When from conquest we shall go, &c.

Each hearty lad shall take his lass,

And beaming like a star,

And in her softer arms forget,

The dangers of the war.

When to conquest we did go, &c.

The rising world shall sing of us,

A thousand years to come,

And to their children’s children tell,

The Wonders we have done.

When to conquest we did go, &c.

So my honest fellows here’s my hand,

My heart, my very soul,

With all the joys of Liberty,

Good fortune and a bowl.

And to conquest we will go, &c.​