LyricMeaning

Battle of Blair Mountain
David Rovics

1921 was the year
Seems like yesterday to me
Let me tell you 'bout what happened then
Back in the mine country
We were fightin' hard to build a union
'Cause at forty cents a ton
There was no way to feed a family
When the minin' day was done

The strike had lasted for a year
When they shot down Smilin' Sid
He was a lawman who stood up for us miners
That's the only crime he ever did
A hundred miners locked up with no trial
There in Mingo-town
But the last straw came in Sharples
When the gunned the women down

Now we're marchin' on to Mingo
Ten thousand men and countin'
Here in the hills of West Virginia
At the Battle of Blair Mountain

We shouted through the hillsides
In every union hall
We're marchin' on to Mingo
Teach them a lesson, once and all
We commandeered every freight train
To the Kentucky line
Took every car that crossed our path
And all the guns and ammo we could find

The union leaders tried to stop us
Mother Jones told us to turn back
But we had learned ourselves from the gun thugs
There's a time to talk and a time to attack
We had no leader, we didn't need one
We all knew the way through Logan County
And we all knew once we got there
We're gonna hang Sheriff Chapin from a sour apple tree

We're marchin' on to Mingo
Ten thousand men and countin'
Here in the hills of West Virginia
At the Battle of Blair Mountain

For three days and nights we fought them
The front was ten miles wide
Every cop and scab in West Virginia
Was there on the other side
They dropped explosives from their airplanes
Such a thing you never saw
They shot us with machine guns
It was the operator's law

We dug trenches and wore helmets
That we brought from the Argonne
All the way from France to Logan
We fought from dusk to dawn
President Harding sent in the Army
And we left our line to them
But the hills of West Virginia
Will long remember when

We were marchin' on to Mingo
Ten thousand men and countin'
Here in the hills of West Virginia
At the Battle of Blair Mountain


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Lyrics by David Rovics

  Alaska   All the Ghosts that Walk this Earth   Ballad of a Cluster Bomb   Behind That Gate   Behind the Barricades   Benton Harbor   Best Democracy Money Can Buy   Bomb Ourselves   Butcher for Hire   By the Time They Nuke DC   Cannabis Cafe   Children of Jerusalem   Contras, Kings and Generals   Crashing Down   Deadhead in Prison   Death of Rachel Corrie   DU   Evening News   From Kabul to Khartoum   Ghost Dance Lullaby   Global Warming Song   Glory and Fame   Good Kurds, Bad Kurds   Halliburton Boardroom Massacre   Hang a Flag in the Window   Here at the End of the World   Hiroshima   I Have Seen the Enemy   I Remember Warsaw   If I Die Tomorrow   In One World   International Terrorists   IRV   Jenin   King David   Korea   Love Song for the Cops   Make It So   Merry Christmas, Mr. Meyers   Miami   Minimum Wage Strike   Minnesota Gezstapo   Morning at Minnehaha   Moron   New Orleans   Next Attack   No One is Illegal   Occupation   One Night in Greece   Operation Iraqi Liberation (O.I.L.)   Oppositional Defiant Disorder   Outside Agitator   Palestine   Parking Lots and Strip Malls   Pirate Radio Song   Pirate Song   Polyamory Song   Pray for the Dead and Fight Like Hell for the...   Promised Land   Punk Rock Baby   Reichstag Fire   Resistance   Return   Rinky Dink Song   Roller Coaster Train   Shut Them Down   Sit Down to Piss   So Many Years Ago   Soldier on the Bum   Song for Ana Belen Montes   Song for Basra   Song for Big Mountain   Song for Boxcar Betty   Song for Eric   Song for Hugh Thompson   Song for My Broken Heart   Song for the BBB   Song for the ELF   Song for the SOA   Song for the SOA #2   Song the Songbird Sings   Stranded   Strike a Blow Against the Empire   T-Stop Cafe   Tennessee   Terror in the Skies   The Alligator Song   The Bicycle Song   The Bluegrass Fiddler   The Death of David Chain   The Flag Desecration Rag   The Jewel of Bucharest   The Key   The Lowell Factory Girl   The Saint Patrick Battalion   The Village Where Nothing Happened   The War is Over   Times Gone By   Too Proud to Beg   Trading with the Enemy   Trafalgar Square   Unrequited Love Song   Used to be a City   Vanguard   We Are Everywhere   We Just Want the World   Welcome to the European Union   What if You Knew   Who Will Tell the People

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