The last farewell

by Roger Whittaker

There's a ship lies rigged and ready in the harbor Tomorrow for old England she sails Far away from your land of endless sunshine To my land full of rainy skies and gales And I shall be aboard that ship tomorrow Though my heart is full of tears at this farewell For you are beautiful, and I have loved you dearly More dearly than the spoken word can tell For you are beautiful, and I have loved you dearly More dearly than the spoken word can tell I've heard there's a wicked war a-blazing And the taste of war I know so very well Even now I see the foreign flag a-raising Their guns on fire as we sail into hell I have no fear of death, it brings no sorrow But how bitter will be this last farewell For you are beautiful, and I have loved you dearly More dearly than the spoken word can tell For you are beautiful, and I have loved you dearly More dearly than the spoken word can tell Though death and darkness gather all about me My ship be torn apart upon the seas I shall smell again the fragrance of these islands In the heaving waves that brought me once to thee And should I return home safe again to England I shall watch the English mist roll through the dale For you are beautiful, and I have loved you dearly More dearly than the spoken word can tell For you are beautiful, and I have loved you dearly More dearly than the spoken word can tell

© Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Roger Whittaker (born March 22, 1936 in Nairobi, Kenya) is a British singer/songwriter and musician with worldwide record sales of more than 55 million. His music is of the folk/easy listening genre. In his early career, his trademark was his fantastic whistling ability. Childhood and beginning Whittaker's parents, Edward and Viola, were originally from Staffordshire, England, where they owned and operated a grocery shop. His father was involved in a motorcycle accident, and the family moved to a farm in Kenya because of the better climate. That Whittaker would eventually become a musician was no surprise, since his grandfather sang in various clubs, and his father played the violin. Roger learned to play the guitar. Whittaker was drafted into national service, and he spent two years in uniform in the Kenya Regiment. In 1956, he was demobilized and decided that it was time to concentrate on a career in medicine. He enrolled at the University of Cape Town in South Africa. He left the university after 18 months and joined the civil service education department to try teaching. To further his teaching career, Whittaker moved to Britain in September 1959. For the next three years, he studied zoology, biochemistry, and marine biology at the University of Wales, Bangor and received a B.Sc. He was one of the brightest students in his class. He continued to sing in local clubs, and released some of his songs on flexi-discs included with the campus newspaper, the Bangor University Rag. Shortly afterwards, he was signed to Fontana Records who released his first professional single, "The Charge of The Light Brigade", in 1962.