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Civil War Battle Ballads

by Tom Flannery

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1.
Bull Run 04:36
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I wanted to get in before I missed the fun the ladies looking at me like I was the only one oh the time I'd have with my stories of war and how I licked the rebels and went back for more Gallant charges on horseback and using the bayonet stopping to have my picture made with nary a regret the bloodied will all rise again for a mural on a wall and I'll bow and tip my cap and catch every minnie ball Of course this was before artillery opened up on poor old me and tore my body clean in two the way it's built to do what fools we were to pray for war now I'm just a frame inside your drawer When I look across Bull Run creek I see much the same today young boys ambushed with the flag when they look the other way I'm the ghost of old wars past a grizzled vet by now dying cures what ails you no matter when or how So when you hear the distant drums and rich men beat their chests and then cower in their bunkers after sending all the rest seek not the marble men who have come before and caused so many mothers to drip tears on the floor Of course this was before artillery opened up on poor old me and tore my body clean in two the way it's built to do what fools we were to pray for war now I'm just a frame inside your drawer When I look across Bull Run creek I see much the same today young boys ambushed with the flag when they look the other way I'm the ghost of old wars past a grizzled vet by now dying cures what ails you no matter when or how
2.
Shiloh 03:51
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Will I hold my ground will I hold my ground will I hold my ground at Shiloh am I honor bound am I honor bound am I honor bound at Shiloh Is my love enough to keep me from the bluff but if it brings me home my fear will I own at Shiloh Can you hear me still can you hear me still can you hear me still from Shiloh When I whisper your name when I whisper your name when I whisper your name from Shiloh is duty and honor bound to staying above the ground or will I die right here while others thump and cheer at Shiloh they say the word means "place of peace" well I don't know 'bout that I seen the elephant the first time then laid myself down flat Don't want to see no more don't want to see no more don't want to see no more at Shiloh had enough of war had enough of war had enough or war at Shiloh All I want is home and some fields to roam untouched by what I've seen running through that stream at Shioh oh the men who sent me here sit safely far away with big words they describe it all praise the Lord and live another day at Shiloh
3.
Antietam 04:31
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I was baptized in the Antietam preacher said I was good to go said the Lord'd been here once and put on quite a show said we needed a good cleansing then he cracked open a beer said son do you realize just what happened here My parents were born and raised you can't choose where you're spit out daddy worked the railroads left mamma with all the doubt she said the house was haunted with dying union boys and she'd sit up until the dawn complaining about the noise Sharpsburg...Antietam or by any other name you can call it what you will it was a bad day just the same Daddy didn't know what to do so he'd take her by the hand and force her out into these fields to make her understand that the war is surely over you can look it up he said the living go on living and the dead they remain dead So I grew up in a bottle moved on to amphetimines figured I'd take my chances but got stuck in between daddy died in '90 right before the first gulf war mamma said don't you dare boy but I went and joined the corps Sharpsburg...Antietam or by any other name you can call it what you will it was a bad day just the same I came home a little later missing pieces of my mind I'd sleep out in bloody lane when I needed to unwind started to hear the same things that mamma said she heard I'd seen the ghosts myself sir now their company I preferred It's a big ol' shitty world it's kill or be killed look around you mister guns lining these hills you wanna get out of here you gotta cut your way through too much water under that bridge too much that we got used to Sharpsburg...Antietam or by any other name you can call it what you will it was a bad day just the same
4.
Chancellorsville 02:41
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Joe Hooker is our leader he takes his whiskey strong but Lee got in his head and made him sing this song singing there I was here I go outta my way you're too damn slow They say he got knocked out by a cannonball and 'twas brandy that revived him and again made him fall singing there I was here I go outta my way you're too damn slow Stonewall turned our flank and the Dutchmen turned and fled I borrowed a dead man's canteen but the water was all red Gave as good as we got and again we're on our way back to where we started to retreat another day Knit another name in that damned battle flag Chancellorsville can go to hell I'll get to heaven stag singing there I was here I go outta my way you're too damn slow throw dirt on the dead men give the wounded men some air toss 'em some hard tack and leave them lying there Chancellorsville I've had my fill if you don't do it then someone will too old to march too young to die I'm only sorry that I can't fly
5.
Gettysburg 04:18
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Wanna see the marble men and the guns of war so I walk among the ghosts and the trinket stores Get behind a double decker bus filled with chaperones in blue trying to keep the troops in line like the officers used to do The dead don't rise they burrow some wait for the carnival to be done orators urge the fight once more out here on this killing floor The minnie balls and the cannister the medal detector crews weighted down with booty and designer marching shoes Shake hands with Lincoln sir you'll find him on the square wearing a pair of Nike's with flowers in his hair Charging up the rocky hill a clenched fist to die and kill bug on the ground was a private in a corps out here on this killing floor come with me come with me home to Gettysburg come with me come with me home to Gettysburg Electoral map...seccession states they say we've come so far how come both still look the same on the frontseat of my car? I've bled not a drop for my country sir but I feel when others do and I often wonder....in '63 if they asked me too.... I'm so tired of thanks and praise and tripping over unknown graves to hell with your god of war out here on this killing floor come with me come with me home to Gettysburg come with me come with me home to Gettysburg So when I drive down Baltimore St does it matter worth a damn? that I sometimes cry for me not them at the kind of man I am When dusk it settles out here and the leaves just start to turn and I'm alone I can hear it all the bits we've never earned come with me come with me home to Gettysburg come with me come with me home to Gettysburg
6.
Chickamauga 03:32
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The word itself comes straight from hell Chickamauga say it well Chattanooga Tennessee an infernal place..please leave me be Sometimes I shake in the middle of the night and my wife will hold me oh so tight until the morning crawls around this quiet little mining town She'll ask about the things I'd seen the friends I lost at age nineteen and what I'd done with my own hands that only a soldier understands Chickamauga Chickamauga why won't you go away why won't you go away why won't you go away from here You'd think that time is all it takes but time grows old and te memories ache and wounds that the naked eye can't see fester and push love away from me My children are grown and have gone their way years and years of nothing to say they come home like ghosts and float right past myself, my chair, and my whiskey glass It was 2 days in 1863 that took the good from inside of me and turned the world into a fearsome place that the hand of god could not erase Chickamauga Chickamauga why won't you go away why won't you go away why won't you go away from here
7.
The Wilderness 04:59
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I can't move it's dark out here full of doubt and full of fear just another scrap won't amount to much 'cept never again will I feel your touch can you get me out of the wilderness? can you get me out of the wilderness? Saw the flames little while ago moving like a snake through the undergrowth I heard the boys it got to first calling for mother ravaged by thirst can you get me out of the wilderness? can you get me out of the wilderness? Screams only meant for God to judge and to ask why he holds a grudge for boys fighting to make others free Lord why you doing this to me can you get me out of the wilderness? can you get me out of the wilderness? can you let this cup pass from my lips I don't want to die out here burned up in the flames of hell a wretched volunteer What good to love with this in store lock me up I'll kick down the door but my legs are gone shot all away here I fell and here I'll stay can you get me out of the wilderness? can you get me out of the wilderness? can you let this cup pass from my lips I don't want to die out here burned up in the flames of hell a wretched volunteer
8.
Cold Harbor 04:12
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Pin my name to the back of my coat this last entry have I willed June 3rd, Virginia, 1864 "Mother, I was killed" See it coming like the rising sun or a storm passing by smell the blood in the air I'm so lonesome I could cry a curse upon Cold Harbor a stain upon the land a curse upon Cold Harbor won't you fight me like a man you can kill me if you can you can kill me if you can You think I'm close to cracking up? you think I'm gonna fall apart? just wait 'till that rebel cannister comes and plows right through my heart You can hang that picture on your wall you can stick me in a frame another used up country boy covered with pieces of someone else's brain a curse upon Cold Harbor a stain upon the land a curse upon Cold Harbor won't you fight me like a man a curse upon Cold Harbor won't you kill me if you can won't you kill me if you can smash my head off of breastworks just like I'm a battering ram you don't know what the hell you're doing you don't even know who I am Stick your romance up your arses and your flag where the sun don't shine move your own self to Richmond leave all of me to mine If this war ever ends and I pass this way again please strike me blind and dumb don't want to see or remember when a curse upon Cold Harbor a stain upon the land a curse upon Cold Harbor won't you fight me like a man you can kill me if you can you can kill me if you can Pin my name to the back of my coat this last entry have I willed June 3rd, Virginia, 1864 "Mother, I was killed"
9.
Franklin 04:50
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My great-granddaddy in black and white just back from Tennessee trouser leg flapping in the breeze from a minnie ball in the knee they say he'd stare into the fire and tear out his own hair from what he'd seen at Franklin and the things that he did there oh Frankin Tennessee Why you still scaring me? Frankin Tennessee won't you leave me be Hood ordered them across that field two miles of open ground silently they closed up ranks as the Yankees shot them down some reached a salient in the front and it was hand to hand from the view of 150 years who among us understands? oh Frankin Tennessee Why you still scaring me? Frankin Tennessee won't you leave me be They say that morphine dulled his pain and drink dulled all the rest and that all learned to be frightened when he bellowed from his breast family turned to rebels and friends to bounty men then he'd hang his head in shame and do it all again oh Frankin Tennessee Why you still scaring me? Frankin Tennessee won't you leave me be So the glory was in Gettysburg where Pickett made his name by losing his division to a massed wall of flame but more men fell at Franklin and it went on and on minutes into hours until near everyone was gone He died by his own hand in 1884 he traveled back to Frankin and laid on the killing floor said he wanted to see the other side where the glory it remains so he put on his blue uniform and put a bullet in his brain oh Frankin Tennessee Why you still scaring me? Frankin Tennessee won't you leave me be What hell's do we create on earth when men they die and kill old men in photo albums and young ones forever still far away from their homes and the love awaiting there duty and other's bidding another unanswered prayer oh Frankin Tennessee Why you still scaring me? Frankin Tennessee won't you leave me be oh Frankin Tennessee Why you still scaring me? Frankin Tennessee won't you leave me be
10.
Appomattox 01:56
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about

There is nothing glamorous about war. General William Tecumseh Sherman, who was certainly in a position to know, called it “all hell”. Too many of the songs of the American Civil War painted the conflict in melodramatic, somehow romantic terms….as if the brave charges depicted on countless murals were some sort of bloodless, chivalric game played out for the illustrators.

There is nothing romantic in these songs. A nationwide cataclysm that caused the death of some 600,000 men might inspire some to heights of martial marching music and barely restrained jingoism, but not little ol’ me.

The Civil War fractured a nation…and in many ways we’re still struggling to put the 2 sides back together. There’s a reason a current electoral map looks like something taken off the desk of the War Department in 1861.

And on a lighter note (thank God), hopefully a few good tunes are contained herein. And free too….always the best kind.

Slàinte….

-tf
12/5/2008

credits

released December 5, 2008

All songs written by Tom Flannery
recorded at the Home Office
remastered October 2012
by Tom Borthwick at Sound Investment Studios

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Tom Flannery Scranton, Pennsylvania

"One of the most gifted songwriters to emerge at the turn of the century"
-- The All Music Guide

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