Tell my dear old mother that I'll see her by and by

199. James J. McCool - "Coming Home to Die" (???, between 1890 and 1902)

The folks at the University of California, Santa Barbara, are doing God's work in not only maintaining their collection of turn of the century cylinder recordings, but digitizing them for all across the world to hear. My fav of the fraction that I've heard so far is this little ditty by James McCool. It's about a wounded soldier setting off for home. But while you form a picture of the main character in your head, consider that this pop song is actually pre-World War I!