The Grand Old Duke of York

The Grand Old Duke of York is a children's nursery rhyme, which, in its most common version, is:

The grand old Duke of York,He had ten thousand men.He marched them up to the top of the hillAnd he marched them down again.

And when they were up, they were up;And when they were down, they were down.But when they were only halfway up,They were neither up nor down!

Frequently, the audience is asked to "act out" the rhyme by standing up, sitting down, and standing halfway up at the appropriate points in the verse.

Origins

in May and recalled to England.

The specific location of the "hill" in the nursery rhyme has long been presumed to be the town of Cassel which is built on a hill which rises 176 metres (about 570 feet) above the otherwise flat lands of Flanders in northern France.

Another alternative derivation is that the Hill is in the Suffolk town of Ipswich, which was a former shipbuilding town; on this hill (Woodbridge Road) there is a pub of this name.

The 'Grand Old Duke' was appointed Field Marshal in 1795 and Commander-in-Chief of the Forces in 1798. Despite a disastrous attack on the Dutch island of Walcheren (1799) and allegations in 1809 that his mistress Mary Anne Clarke used her influence to buy officer commissions, the Duke returned to his command in 1811 and played a great part as a backscene administrator in organising the Duke of Wellington's victories in the Peninsular War. He became heir presumptive to the throne in 1820, but predeceased his elder brother King George IV in 1827.

However, an alternative derivation is that the rhyme relates the story of Richard, Duke of York at the Battle of Wakefield on 30 December 1460 (the same Richard who is the subject of the mnemonic "Richard of York gave battle in vain" for the colours of the rainbow). Richard's army, some 8,000 strong, was awaiting reinforcements at "the top of the hill" at Sandal Castle in Wakefield (the castle was built on top of a Norman motte). He was surrounded by Lancastrian forces some three times that number, but nonetheless chose to sally forth ("...marched them down again") to fight. Richard died in a pitched battle at Wakefield Green, together with between one third and one half of his army; several other Yorkist nobles were killed, and others were captured and later executed (including Richard's son, Edmund, Earl of Rutland and Richard Neville, 5th Earl of Salisbury). The severed heads of the dead nobles were displayed in public in York.

More authoritative sources, such as Opie's "Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes" and Robert's "Heavy Words Thrown Lightly", reveal several earlier versions of this rhyme. These described the military incompetence of leaders of other battles. One of the earliest known versions, for example, described the King of France leading 40,000 men. According to Opie and Robert, this rhyme had very little to do with "any" Duke of York, but was used instead more like children at school singing "Mary and David up in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G", swapping the names to fit whoever they wanted to torment that day.

ong

"The Grand Old Duke of York" is also sung to the tune of "A—Hunting We Will Go". [Cite book | publisher = Boy Scouts of America | title = Cub Scout Songbook | date = 1955] It is used as an action song within many Scouting organizations. The song is repeated with the actions, getting faster each time.

References