DESCRIPTION:
"Sgt. MacKenzie" is a lament written and sung by Joseph Kilna MacKenzie.

Joseph MacKenzie wrote the haunting lament after the death of his wife, Christine, and in memory of his great-grandfather, Charles Stuart MacKenzie, a sergeant in the Seaforth Highlanders, who along with hundreds of his brothers-in-arms from the Elgin-Rothes area in Moray, Scotland went to fight in the Great War. Sergeant MacKenzie was bayoneted to death at the age of 35, while defending one of his badly injured fellow soldiers in the hand-to-hand fighting of the trenches.

The track was then included in his band Clann An Drumma's album Tried and True. While working on the film We Were Soldiers, director Randall Wallace, received a CD of the album and was haunted by the emotion and spirit of reverence captured in "Sgt. MacKenzie". He arranged for Joe and band mate Donnie MacNeil, who played the pipes, to re-record "Sgt. MacKenzie" with the backing of an 80-piece orchestra and the United States Military Academy Choir at the famous Abbey Road Studios in London. The lament was introduced into the film during key scenes with MacKenzie singing on his own and on the last track of the film with the orchestra and choir.

We Were Soldiers is a 2002 American war film that dramatized the Battle of Ia Drang on November 14, 1965 — the first major engagement of the United States Army in the Vietnam War. The film was directed by Randall Wallace and stars Mel Gibson. It is based on the book We Were Soldiers Once... And Young by Lieutenant General (Ret.) Hal Moore and reporter Joseph L. Galloway, both of whom were at the battle.

English Translation
Lay me down in the cold cold ground
Where before many more have gone
Lay me down in the cold cold ground
Where before many more have gone

When they come I will stand my ground
Stand my ground I'll not be afraid

Thoughts of home take away my fear
Sweat and blood hide my veil of tears

Once a year say a prayer for me
Close your eyes and remember me

Never more shall I see the sun
For I fell to a Germans gun

Lay me down in the cold cold ground
Where before many more have gone
Lay me down in the cold cold ground
Where before many more have gone

Where before many more have gone

In memory of Sgt. Charles Stuart MacKenzie
Seaforth Highlanders
Who along with many others gave up his life
So that we can live free

We will remember them