This song briefly describes the suffering of the soldiers in the episode known as the "Charge Of The Light Brigade", which took place in the Battle of Balaclava (October 25th, 1854) in the Crimean War. The episode was portrayed in a poem by Alfred Tennyson, which made it a symbol for the nonsense of war. The terrible hardships faced in old age by veterans are portrayed in another poem by Rudyard Kipling. Lyrics for this song has been based on these two poems.