White Winter Hymnal Lyrics

Lyric discussion by Digit 

Cover art for White Winter Hymnal lyrics by Fleet Foxes

In a war, winter. A resistance group who wore red scarves. Men were forced to join or were killed (in that way the scarves kept their heads from "falling in the snow"). The forced recruitment included fairly young men, hence allusions to youth. The narrator's friend gets shot. Don't know about the "swallowed in their coats" bit.