The Maid of Monterrey

Something for the weekend.  Almost all Mexican War songs have vanished into historical obscurity.  A possible exception is The Maid of Monterrey.  Written in 1848 by J. H. Hewitt, it was not published until 1851, so its claim to be a Mexican War song, as opposed to a song about the Mexican War, is dubious.  It memorializes a Mexican senorita who tended the wounded of the battle of Monterrey on both sides until she was killed:

The Maid of Monterrey

The moonlight shone but dimly
Upon the battle plaine
A gentle breeze faned softly
Oer the features of the slain
The guns had hushed their thunder
The drums in silence lay
Then came the senorita
The Maid of Monterey.

She gave a look of anguish
On the dying and the dead
And she made her lap a pillow
For him who moaned and bled
Now heres to that bright beauty
Who drives deaths pangs away
That meek eyed senorita
The Maid of Monterey.

Although she loved her country
And prayed that it might live
Yet for the wounded foreigner
A tear she had to give
And when the dying soldier
In her bright gleam did pray
They blessed the senorita
The Maid of Monterey.

She gave the thirsty watter
And dressed each bleeding wound
A fervent prayr she uttered
For those whom death had doomed
And when the bugle sounded
Just at the break of day
They all blest the senorita
The Maid of Monterey.