"You'll Never Know" (Vera Lynn, 1943)

Vera Lynn's wartime popularity with the British public provided her with "Vera Lynn's Own Orchestra", conducted by the very capable Len Edwards.

"You'll Never Know" won composer Harry Warren & lyricist Mack Gordon the Oscar for best song in '43--it was introduced by Alice Faye in "Hello Frisco".

YOU'LL NEVER KNOW

You'll never know just how much I miss you,
You'll never know just how much I care...
And if I tried, I still couldn't hide my love for you,
You ought to know, for haven't I told you so,
A million or more times?

You went away and my heart went with you,
I speak your name in my every prayer.
If there is some other way to prove that I love you
I swear I don't know how...
You'll never know if you don't know now.

You went away and my heart went with you,
I speak your name in my every prayer.
If there is some other way to prove that I love you,
I swear I don't know how...
You'll never know if you don't know now.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

From Wiki:

"You'll Never Know" is a popular song. The music was written by Harry Warren and the lyrics by Mack Gordon, based on a poem written by a young Oklahoma war bride named Dorothy Fern Norris.

The song was featured in the 1943 movie Hello, Frisco, Hello where it is sung by Alice Faye. It was also performed by Faye in the 1944 film Four Jills in a Jeep. It was recorded in 1943 by, among others, Frank Sinatra and Dick Haymes. Haymes' version was a #1 hit on the R&B charts that year.

Sinatra recorded his version at his first recording session at Columbia as a solo artist. (He had recorded at Columbia in 1939 as a member of Harry James's band.) It was arranged and conducted by Alec Wilder with the Bobby Tucker Singers providing accompaniment. Sinatra's version charted for 16 weeks starting July 24 and spent two weeks at number 2.

***In Britain, the recording by Vera Lynn was very popular due to the ongoing Second World War.

A 1952 recording by Rosemary Clooney is also well known, as well as a version recorded in 1954 by Big Maybelle.

The Sinatra and Haymes records were made during the 1942--1944 strike against the recording companies a strike by the American Federation of Musicians. As a result, the recordings were made without musicians, with vocal groups replacing the usual instrumental backup. The group backing Haymes, The Song Spinners, was actually given credit on the records.

The song was the first song that Barbra Streisand ever recorded in 1955. It was the opening song on her 4-CD box-set Just for the Record (1991). The box-set closed with another version of the song, sung as a duet by Streisand in 1991 and herself as a girl of 13.

The song won the 1943 Academy Award for Best Original Song, one of nine nominated songs that year.

In 1961, a version by Shirley Bassey made #6 in the UK charts.