I was picked up and taken into their trench. And I'd no sooner taken two three steps down the trench when I heard, "Ho Hello Razz, I'm glad to see you! This is my second night here," he said "I'm feeling bad." And it was Bill Hubbard, one of the men we'd trained in England, one of the original battalion. I had to look at his wound, rolled him over. I could see that it was probably a fatal wound. You could imagine what pain he was in, he was drippin' with sweat. And after I'd gone about three shell-holes, traversed that, had it been... had there been a path or a road, I could have done better.
He pummelled me, "Put me down, put me down, I'd rather die, I'd rather die, put me down."
I was hoping he would faint. He said, "I can't go any further, let me die." I said, "If I leave you here, Bill, you won't be found. Let's have another go." He said, "All right then."
The same thing happened. He wouldn't... he couldn't stand it any more, and I had to leave him there. In no-man's-land.
And then, er, we went down, and ahm, I put the children to bed. And I tidied the flat and everything. And then they were asleep and everything was a kind of night. I made a bed in the bathroom. I carried them there and put on the gas bottle.
But today when I think back peh.. about that. If God did take me, I would've have been in hell because I wasn't right."
Reached back for the bottle
And rubbed against the lamp
Genie came out smiling
Like some Eastern tramp
He said hey boy what's happening
What is going on
You can have three wishes
If you don't take too long
I said well
I wish they were all happy in the Lebanon
Wish somebody'd help me write this song
I wish when I was young
My old man had not been gone
Genie said consider it done
There's something in the air
And you don't know what it is
You see someone through the window
Who you've just learned to miss
And the road leads on to glory but
You've used up your last wish
Your last wish
And you want her to come home
Genie said I'm sorry
But that's the way it goes
Where the hell's the lamp sucker
It's time for me to go
Bye
There's something in the air
And you don't know what it is
You see someone through the window
Who you've just learned to miss
And the road leads on to glory
But you've used up your last wish
Your last wish
And you want her to come home
Spoken (Alf Razzell): "Years later, I saw Bill Hubbard's name on the memorial to the missing at Aras. And I...when I saw his name I was absolutely transfixed; it was as though he...he was now a human being instead of some sort of nightmarish memory of how I had to leave him, all those years ago. And I felt relieved, and ever since then I've felt happier about it, because always before, whenever I thought of him, I said to myself, 'Was there something else that I could have done?' [background: "I'd rather die, I'd rather die..."] And that always sort of worried me. And having seen him, and his name in the register - as you know in the memorials there's a little safe, there's a register in there with every name - and seeing his name and his name on the memorial; it sort of lightened my...heart, if you like."
Spoken (Woman): "When was it that you saw his name on the memorial?"
Spoken (Alf Razzell): "Ah, when I was eighty-seven, that would be the year, ninete...eighty-four, nineteen eighty-four."
