Top of page

From the halls of Montezuma,
To the shores of Tripoli...

The "Marines' Hymn" has an engaging history. Its tune originally came from the "march" section of Jacques Offenbach's comic opera Genevieve de Brabant. First presented as a melodramatic work in 1859, Offenbach's material was subsequently reshaped into a comic opera that opened in Paris in 1867. To that production the composer added the "march of the men of arms."

It is not known when the first words of the "Marine's Hymn" were added to the Offenbach music, nor by whom. One, or possibly two, early verses have been traced to Colonel Henry C. Davis who wrote them during the early part of the twentieth century.

Image: Sergeant Alfred Edward Lewis Sergeant Alfred Edward Lewis, U.S. Marine Corps, Leaps High into the Air, Parris Island, South Carolina. Alfred T. Palmer or Pat Terry, photographer, May 1942. Prints and Photographs Division

The hymn's lyrics reflect the Corps values, pride and the various campaigns in which the U.S. Marine Corps has participated. For example, "From the halls of Montezuma" refers to Marine participation in the Mexican-American War (1846-1848), during which the Marines fought their way from Veracruz to Mexico City under the leadership of General Winfield Scott. "To the shores of Tripoli" refers to Marine participation in the war against the pirates of the Barbary States (1801-1805), during which they marched across 600 miles of Libyan desert with a group of Navy men and others, to capture the port city of Derna, Tripoli.

The first version of the song was copyrighted, published and distributed in 1919 by The Leatherneck - a Marine Corps magazine printed in Quantico, Virginia. On November 21, 1942, the Commandant of the United States Marine Corps approved a slight change in the words of the first verse to read, "In the air, on land, and sea" instead of the earlier, "On the land as on the sea."

Learn More About It
Related Web Sites
Print Bibliography
  1. Alexander, Joseph H., with Don Horan and Norman C. Stahl. A fellowship of valor: the battle history of the United States Marines. New York: HarperCollins, 1997. Call number: VE23 .A94 1997.
  2. Bartlett, Merrill L. and Jack Sweetman. The U.S. Marine Corps: an illustrated history. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2001. Call number: VE23 .B37 2001.
  3. Dixon, James Qallan. Genevieve de Brabant, an original novel of fact and fiction; a romance of love, travel, self-scarifice, adventure and war in France, England, Italy, Malta, South Africa. Chicago: [s.n.], 1904. Call number: PZ3. D6435 G.
  4. Harding, James. Jacques Offenbach: a biography. New York: Riverrun Press, 1980. Call number: ML410 .O41 H37.
  5. Hoffman, Jon T., ed. USMC: a complete history. Quantico, Virginia: Marine Corps Association; [s.l.]: H.L. Levin Associates, 2002. Call number: VE23 .U873 2002.

About this Item

Title

  • Marines' Hymn

Created / Published

  • Library of Congress, Washington, DC, 2002.

Headings

  • -  Popular Songs of the Day
  • -  Songs and Music
  • -  Songs Collections

Genre

  • article

Additional Metadata Formats

Rights & Access

Copyright and Restrictions

The Library of Congress is providing access to these materials for educational and research purposes and makes no warranty with regard to their use for other purposes. The written permission of the copyright owners and/or other rights holders (such as holders of publicity and/or privacy rights) is required for distribution, reproduction, or other use of protected items beyond that allowed by fair use or other statutory exemptions. There may be content that is protected as "works for hire" (copyright may be held by the party that commissioned the original work) and/or under the copyright or neighboring-rights laws of other nations.

Responsibility for making an independent legal assessment of an item and securing any necessary permissions ultimately rests with persons desiring to use the item. Users should consult the bibliographic information that accompanies each item for specific information. This catalog data provides the details known to the Library of Congress regarding the corresponding items and may assist users in making independent assessments of the legal status of these items as related to their desired uses.

Items included here with the permission of the rights holders are indicated as such in the bibliographic record for each item.

Because of copyright laws, songs from the twentieth century may not be represented by very many items on the Web site. While every effort has been made to obtain permission to use these songs or portions of these songs, in some cases this has not been possible. Therefore there may be no recordings or paper items to illustrate those songs. In some instances, the rights' owner may have only granted permission to use a portion of the material online. In those cases, only 30-second excerpts of sound recordings are used, and only one or two pages of print or manuscript materials are used.

The use of U.S. Armed Forces sound recordings in no way indicates an endorsement of the Web site by any branch of the Armed Forces.

In some cases, the Library was unable to identify a possible rights holder and has elected to place some of those items online as an exercise of fair use for strictly non-commercial educational uses. The Library of Congress would like to learn more about these materials and would like to hear from individuals or institutions that have any additional information or know of their history. Please contact: Performing Arts Reading Room.

Suggested credit line: Library of Congress, Music Division

Cite This Item

Citations are generated automatically from bibliographic data as a convenience, and may not be complete or accurate.

Chicago citation style:

Marines' Hymn. Library of Congress, Washington, DC, 2002. Manuscript/Mixed Material. https://www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200000011/.

APA citation style:

(2002) Marines' Hymn. Library of Congress, Washington, DC. [Manuscript/Mixed Material] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200000011/.

MLA citation style:

Marines' Hymn. Library of Congress, Washington, DC, 2002. Manuscript/Mixed Material. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200000011/>.