This has been one of my favorite poems ever since I first heard it many many years ago. Maybe because it’s almost unbearably sentimental, and it makes one wonder what happened to Little Boy Blue:
Sphere: Related ContentLittle Boy Blue
The little toy dog is covered with dust,
 But sturdy and staunch he stands;
And the little toy soldier is red with rust,
 And his musket moulds in his hands.
Time was when the little toy dog was new,
 And the soldier was passing fair,
And that was the time when our Little Boy Blue
 Kissed them and put them there.“Now, don’t you go till I come,” he said,
 “And don’t you make any noise!”
So toddling off to his trundle bed
 He dreamt of his pretty toys.
And as he was dreaming, an angel song
 Awakened our Little Boy Blue, -
Oh, the years are many, the years are long
 But the little toy friends are true!Ay, faithful to Little Boy Blue they stand,
 Each in the same old place.
Awaiting the touch of a little hand,
 The smile of a little face.
And they wonder, as waiting these long years through,
 In the dust of that little chair,
What has become of our Little Boy Blue
 Since he kissed them and put them there.~Eugene Field, 1850-1895~
March 24th, 2008 at 7:35 am
You may have learned by now that the boy described in Eugene Field’s beloved poem Little Boy Blue was his own son, who died when he was a little boy. Field had eight children. Two died when infants, and the other as a boy. My mother loved this poem, and I do as well, although I have 2 little boys of my own now, I find it heartwrenching to read.
TMS: No, I didn’t know the story behind the poem. Thanks so much for sharing it. That makes it even more sad.
September 21st, 2008 at 3:01 am
Finally! I sort of found the history behind the Little Boy Blue… I really need it for my Literature report.. thank you so much..
Yep. the poem is really heartwarming. It may sound childish but it is really sad..
September 26th, 2008 at 7:04 am
Ha!
I woke up this morning with this poem in my head and couldn’t get back to sleep until I had recited the whole thing to myself.
I recognize that it is not great literature, yet there is something about it that I love — something that made me commit it to memory as a child and still retain it almost 50 years later.
Good to see that I am not alone.
October 14th, 2008 at 4:43 pm
Wow that is soo sad! But thanks for the blog I too need it for school work.
November 15th, 2008 at 8:05 am
Does anyone know where I could find a recording of this poem? My mother sang it to me when I was little, and she told me it was sung in a movie during the early 1950s.
November 15th, 2008 at 7:53 pm
I didn’t know that the poem had been put to music. I would love to hear it sung. It’s such a sweet and sad poem.
November 17th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
Yes, the poem was set to music by one Ethelbert Nevin (?!) and can be heard on an excellent CD by tenor John Aler called “Songs We Forgot to Remember.”
November 17th, 2008 at 9:57 pm
Thanks, john palik, for the information. Using that information, I was able to find the song on iTunes and downloaded it to my iPod. However, I haven’t been able to find it on YouTube to share here. Thanks again!
November 20th, 2008 at 5:11 am
Wow thanks so much for the interpretation of this poem…i didnt know it was his own son that died…i need this for school work as well…=D
December 16th, 2008 at 5:14 am
Can anyone tell me the name of Eugene Field’s son who is the subject of Little Boy Blue. Eugene Field is Eugene Field, Sr. Was the son’s name Eugene Field, Jr.?
January 6th, 2009 at 6:51 am
March 11th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
i really did not get the poem at first and i’m still trying to internalize the message of the poem. all i can understand is that little boy blue is gone yet i can’t figure out why he passed away and how did it happen.. will somebody care to answer me? thanks in advance.. mwuah!
April 2nd, 2009 at 1:43 pm
Thank you for the input on this poem. I am home schooling my children (4 & 6) and this was our poem reading for today. The children asked about the boy - thinking perhaps he had been playing in Heaven and the Angel brought the boy to Earth. I told them it sounded like the boy had been called home to Heaven, but would check to make sure that my interpretation was correct. Thank you for the history on the author. Prayers for your granddaughter, Lily. Blessings, Ellen
May 25th, 2009 at 12:11 pm
If you think this peom is pretty, you need to get the Irish Rover’s song version of it. Will definitely make you cry the first 50 times you listen to it.
Vary Beautiful
Dave
June 5th, 2009 at 6:37 pm
So so sad x
August 8th, 2009 at 4:25 pm
I just found out today from watching a PBS special..one of Eugene Field’s sons..Eugene Fields II..was guilty of falling in with a forgerer of Lincoln artifacts..seems during the 20’s and 30’s, during a resurge in Lincoln’s popularity..E.F. II sold fake copies of “authentic” momentos signed by Lincoln.Makes me sad..Ive visited the home in St. Louis and always loved the poem..
November 14th, 2009 at 10:29 am
I truly love this poem. I have 3 Sons and I lost my first Son prematurely @ 7 month pregnant. I have always wondered what he would be like should he had been born. However, reading this poem, yes, I agree he must have died. But, then, I think, maybe he grew up and no longer played with his little toys. Wishful thinking.
January 25th, 2010 at 6:11 am
I’m finding it really hard to get the Irish Rovers version,(I suspect it’s the one I listened to),but I’ll persevere. Just found out that this song is on an album of John McCormack recordings called Favourites Vol 1 and it’s a beautiful version- far more touching than the John Aler one. I learnt and loved this as a child in the 70’s and I’m thrilled to rediscover it. God bless the internet!
January 27th, 2010 at 6:07 am
PS the John McCormack version is now on YouTube- far,far better than John Aler. It’s the first time in over 30 years that I’ve heard the whole song. So ,so lovely, but so sad.
February 18th, 2010 at 9:03 pm
I’m 14, and I am doing a Diorama on “Little Boy Blue”. We got to choose our poem and as soon as I read this one I just knew it would be PERFECT! I have always been really good at reading and understanding poems, but not writing them. This poem though, i thought was about a boy who was beginning to to grow up and “grow out” of his toys. And that the purpose/message was about how every now and again you have to go back to just being a kid again. Even if it is just for a day, and look back at the past and at what made you happy and who you are today , instead of just worrying about “adult things”. But after reading all of this I see I was VERY wrong!
Thats very sad about the boy, and his dad.
February 24th, 2010 at 9:45 pm
Our town of Monson, Ma is celebrating its 250 th anniversary this year. I was happy to discovered that Eugene Field attended the Monson Academy in 1865 and is a part of our history. Reading “Little Boy Blue” again has brought me back 40 years to the first time I read it and left me with a profound sense of melancholy.
February 25th, 2010 at 9:39 am
Completeley agree about being left with a sense of melancholy, such a sad and beautiful poem. I first read it on a website dedicated to little James Bulger. Even though it was written about another boy it fits his tragic story so well, I find it hard to read this poem and not cry as it always makes me think of poor James. This poem has definitely touched a place in my heart.
April 8th, 2010 at 10:34 am
One month ago I was visiting with my 86 year old father. He was talking about the poem he heard in 3rd grade. He recited it for me…”Little Boy Blue”. He remembered nearly every word. The next day I bought a book of poems at a garage sale and yes, “Little Boy Blue” was in it. I am going to look for the CD to give him.
May 5th, 2010 (3 weeks ago) at 1:06 pm
As a young child,I memorized this poem. My mother had written it down for she also had memorized it but she didn’t know the author. As a team or co-teacher, our regular education teacher had required our students to memorize a poem, and this poem came to mind. Here I am some 40 years later remembering every word of the poem and finially finding out the poet and story behind it. I wish my mother was still alive so I could share it with her.
June 25th, 2010 at 5:31 pm
I too have always loved this poem, one my mother lovingly taught me when I was in 2nd grade back in 1962. She knew it by heart and told me that the poem was about a little boy who had died. I can still (tearfully)recite the poem from memory, and wonder if its message of faithful toys had an influence on the creators of Toy Story III?
June 30th, 2010 at 4:53 am
I recall memorizing this poem 50 years ago when I was in parochial school. Yesterday, while looking through an old “Prose and Poetry” anthology, I found the poem with an illustration showing a toy dog and a toy soldier resting on a tiny chair. I’d forgotten how sad the poem was, and found that the chosen illustration was especially well chosen and poignant. A wonderful childhood memory to have rediscovered this poem.
July 16th, 2010 at 1:36 pm
My Grandmother was a first cousin to Eugene Field. Dad, was a 2nd cousin (Lester Eugene Beaty) and I, Eugene A. Beaty am a 3rd cousin. And the peom is about a son who passed away at a very young age (I don’t know his name.) You’ll find that several of Gene’s poem’s are “tear jerkers”. I have many of his books and enjoy them all. Thanks for all the loving comments. Gene Beaty
July 27th, 2010 at 3:42 am
I was about 10. I had a friend from Sunday school passed on the Sunday know as Childrens Day at the 2nd UPChurch in Pgh,PA. June 10th
It was a sad day. My mother had read this to me before Steven drowned and
I always think of him when I read this poem. Now my Mum is in ICU and again I think of how she read this to me so long ago.
October 25th, 2010 at 5:25 pm
My little boy was killed many years ago, and my father-in-law had a copy of a small record (a 45) by the great sax player Billy Vaughn in which this poem is memorialized (read by Ken Norton who has a great voice) and the first time I heard it I wept profusely. I have never gotten over my son’s untimely death, so much so I just began a blog on death (wwwnether-hd.blogspot.com) where I am beginning the entire story of my Eric’s death. Eugene Field’s tragically beautiful poem will remain with me forever. Please check out my blog…
November 22nd, 2010 at 10:28 am
In the late 1940s a Los Angeles radio station carried a dramatization of the death of Field’s son and the writing of the poem, interviewing a relative.
The Los Angeles Times, Mar. 15, 1953, printed an interview with Field’s grandson, a Sierra Madre resident, and describes the Field memorabilia that the grandson owned.
December 1st, 2010 at 7:41 am
My mother read this to me when I was around five or six years old. I begged for it again and again many, many nights, and she would patiently read it again. I believe it had a good influence on me because of how it expresses deep love and loss. I don’t remember if Mother told me the boy was the author’s son, but I knew a little boy had died. The poem has stayed with me all these years.
December 12th, 2010 at 9:15 am
I too join the group who were introduced to this lovely, albeit sentimental, poem by his or her mother. I too woke up this morning and began to recite the poem. As I understand it, the child did die that night and his parents kept the toys exactly where he had placed them for years and years. That is why Fields began the poem with “The little toy dog is covered with dust . . . and . . .his musket moulds in his hand.” The toys have not been touched nor dusted during the time that passed from the time of the child’s death to the time of the writing of the poem.
Mother had told me that the Fields home in MA had been open to tourists and that the toys were still there. This was in the 1940s so who knows if the house is still open to the public. It might have been torn down for condos by now.
January 2nd, 2011 at 12:33 pm
Billy Vaughn did record this on the Dot record label in 1956. The narrator was Ken Nordine not Ken Norton. The hit side of the record was “Three Penny Opera” theme.
March 16th, 2011 at 7:33 pm
Wow, there are a lot of us who remember this poem from many years ago and are still touched by it. For some reason it came to my mind here at home a half hour or so ago, while I was up on a ladder watering plants, and I recited it for myself, my dog and my bird. They didn’t pay much attention to it, but I cried once again, just as I have every time since I first memorized it … well over half a century ago!? I didn’t know it was set to music; I’ll look for the song on YouTube … I have really enjoyed reading everyone’s comments - young or old, we all share similar responses to the poem, don’t we!
April 12th, 2011 at 9:29 am
My Mother use to recite this to me when I was a little girl and we would both cry. I recited it to my son and two daughters as they were growing up too.
April 14th, 2011 at 8:19 pm
i love this poem everytime i read it it makes me cry i sometimes wake up in the morning wit it stuck n my head and everyone asks y im depressed tat day its cause im think of this poem
May 25th, 2011 at 1:28 am
using this for schoolwork…meant to write a two page essay about the symbolism in it…but in the end it really is just a children’s poem…i dunno if theres really two pages in there, even if you do squeeze out of the personal stuff about Field’s own son…
May 25th, 2011 at 7:26 am
the whole reason for the poem little boy blue is to tell the world what had happened to him.he wrote it to say his son died and he always played with his little toys the most
August 13th, 2011 at 12:24 pm
one of the first poems I memorized when I took “expression”. am attending a poetry reading reception tonight and plan to recite it.
September 15th, 2011 at 5:36 pm
Reading all the comments here has been nostalgic… and informative. I first read this poem in an issue of “Coronet” magazine, which my mother got at the time. It was featured with a wonderful color illustration of the chair and toys and has always stayed with me.
I never committed it to memory (that was reserved for “Little Orphan Annie”), but committed it to heart, just as so many others have.
These are truly the hallmarks of a great writer: eliciting emotions and impacting lives decades later.
November 23rd, 2011 at 1:02 am
My Dad used to say this poem to my two sisters and myself at night when we were growing up. It took several years before we realized what it was all about. He only said as much of it as he remembered his Mother saying to him, but when I was a senior in high school, I finally found a copy of it in a book of poems. I typed it up in typing class and have kept that copy in my purse so I would always know the exact words. That was 1972. Next year it will be 40 years old. My Dad is gone now, but I find myself reading it still. It’s a little worn, but somehow comforting.
January 24th, 2012 at 6:54 am
The poem, contrary to popular belief, is not about the death of the author’s son, who did in fact die but several years after the publishing of the poem.
January 24th, 2012 at 7:42 am
As Lou said the poem is not about Mr. Fields son, who did die later. He needed a rhyme for the 7th line in the first stanza, and that is how he came up with Little Boy Blue
January 27th, 2012 at 4:37 pm
As a child (I was born in 1951…so maybe around 1955) I had a 45rpm record with this poem spoken and set to beautiful music. The voice was especially melancholy, and I remember it made me cry…sentimental tears. I thought it was a
Disney record, with maybe Johnny Appleseed on the reverse side. Not sure. But I would love to hear that recording again. Anyone know what I’m talking about?
February 8th, 2012 at 11:55 am
I’m from St. Joseph, Missouri where Eugene Field lived for some time. This poem was a favorite in our hometown with several places including a school named for the poet. Our library featured a statue of the little boy. Lovers Lane was a popular romantic spot for young lovers and the boulevard system is still beautiful. We were all taught the story that it was about Field’s own child who died.
February 27th, 2012 at 9:53 am
This poem was published before the death of Fields’ son, oddly. It is still a lovely poem about childhood and death.
June 2nd, 2012 at 4:26 pm
Some say this is not about Eugene Field’s little boy, but that is what my Grandmother told me. She said she learned the poem as a young girl. My Grandmother recited this poem from memory to all us kids from the time I could remember. She told me that the author was a family friend and the as far as she knew the poem had not been published. I was born in 1950 and my Grandmother was born in 1899.
February 26th, 2013 at 11:57 pm
can you give me a conclusion about this poem? Thank you
)
April 13th, 2013 at 7:09 pm
I was first introduced to this poem in AP English class. Our teacher cited it as an example of bad, sentimental poetry. While it may be not be Great Literature, a person would have to have a heart of stone not to be moved by it.