The Railroad Boy- Buell Kazee (KY) 1928 REC
[Recorded Brunswick 437, January 1928, released 1930. "In the Pine" by Roberts has two additional stanzas at the beginning.
R. Matteson 2017]
The Railroad Boy- sung by Buell Kazee of Magoffin County, Kentucky. Recorded on January 16, 1928 in New York City.
[banjo]
She went upstairs to make her bed[1]
And not one word to her mother said,
Her mother she, went upstairs too,
Says, "Daughter dear daughter, what troubles you?"
"Oh Mother, oh mother, I cannot tell
That railroad boy I love so well;
He's courted me, my life away
And now at home he will not stay."
"There is a place in London town
Where that railroad boy goes and sits down
He takes that strange girl on his knee,
And he tells to her, what he won’t tell me"
Her father he came home from work
And says "Where’s my daughter? She seems so hurt"
He went upstairs to give her hope
But found her hanging on a rope.
He took his knife and he cut her down,
And on her bosom these words he found.
"Go dig my grave both wide and deep,
Place a marble slab at my head and feet.
And over my coffin place a snow white dove
To warn this world that I died for love."
________________
1. These two stanzas are first in Robert's version from Kazee:
In Lebanon City there once did dwell,
That railroad boy I loved so well,
He courted me my life away,
And now at home he will not stay.
There is a place in Lebanon Town,
Where that railroad boy goes and sits down,
He takes a strange girl on his knee,
And tells to her what he won't tell me.]