This Carol has an interesting background. The lyrics were written as a poem by a young man who was suffering from tuberculosis during a harshly cold winter in the early 1930s. He was inspired by his memories of playing as a child in the snow and dreaming of becoming healthy once again in order to enjoy the winter. He showed the poem to a musician friend who wrote the music for it. However, the young man, named Richard Smith, died one year later at the age of 34 and never saw how popular this Christmas Carol would become.