Trying to expunge war, army and navy from England’s folk tradition, what Sewell’s mission seems to want, is to cut out so much that’s important in that tradition. We cannot deny that men went to war, fought with Henry V, with Drake, Marlborough, Nelson and Wellington. Nor can we deny that those men, and very often the women they left behind, are right near the heart of England’s traditions. We don’t know the names of those men, they are, allpoetry.com/A-Charm “...mere uncounted folk, Of whose life and death is none, Report or lamentation”. But through music, verse and the traditions of England those men and women are remembered.