John Edwards Memorial Foundation [JEMF] Quarterly, #16 (Winter 1969), transcribed by Malcolm V Blackard as part of an article on the Wilmer Watts groups:

FIGHTIN' IN THE WAR WITH SPAIN (Paramount 3254)

The captain called out for volunteers, I shouldered up my gun;
First Spaniard that I seen I dropped my gun and run,
But I'se fightin' for that battleship of Maine.

chorus:
I'se fightin' in this great war with Spain
Fightin' for the battleship of Maine;
Oh, get back, Spain, I don't own your name
I'm fightin' for this battleship of Maine.

Marched out on the battlefield, I fell upon my knees,
First thing my eyes fell on was a great big pot of peas,
But I'se fightin' for the battleship of Maine.

repeat chorus

The peas they was greasy, meat it was fat,
The rest fought the Spaniards, but I was fightin' that,
While I'se fightin' for this battleship of Maine.

repeat chorus

The blood it was running, I was running too
Give my feet good exercise like nothing else could do,
While I'se fightin' for this battleship of Maine.

The captain asked me why I run, was I 'fraid to die?
Told him the reason that I run, cause I couldn't fly,
But I'm fightin' for this battleship of Maine.

It's all about the ... [can't understand what he's saying]+
All about this battleship of Maine,
Oh, git back Spain, I don't own your name,
I'm fighting for this battleship of Maine.

I marched around to Cuby, all back to Spain
The shot was falling round me, just like a shower of rain,
But I'se fightin' for the battleship of Maine.

I marched around to Cuby, I thought I'd lose my life,
Before I'd go to war again I'd send my darling wife,
To fight for all this battleship of Maine.

repeat chorus

You ought to seen the boat come around the bend,
It wss loaded down with American men,
Ready for war, honey babe, as sure as you're born.

You can dodge behind the window, hide behind the door
But you can't dodge American long .44s*
While I'm fightin' for this battleship of Maine.

+The chorus changes a bit, midway hrough, and I don't understand the singer's lyrics on the first line.

*Blackard's text leaves the second half of this line as ..., but it seems reasonably clear to me.

Blackard's headnote to the song references an article in Journal of Popular Culture, II (Spring 1969) called "We'll Make the Spanish Grunt" by W K McNeil, a survey of Sp-Am War pop songs, and refers to other hillbilly versions of the song -- by Red Patterson's Piedmont Log Rollers (downloadable at Juneberry as "Battleship of Maine"), Jimmie Yates' Boll Weevils (downloadable at Juneberry as "Bloody War" -- my favorite version of the song), and Richard Harold's "Battleship of Maine." Charlie Poole's "If I Lose, I Don't Care" is related in melody but not lyrics. It's also quite similar in tune to the versions of "All Night Long" that were done by Frank Hutchison and Uncle Dave ("Ain't It A Shame to Keep Your Honey Out in the Rain"). Blackard presumes a vaudeville origin for the song but doesn't know of a printed source antedating the hillbilly recordings of the 1920s. He also cites the Frank C Brown Collection of NC Folklore, II:550, for a field version.

Scotty Wiseman recast this as a WWI song in the late 1930s, "That Crazy War." Stringbean and I independently rewrote it in the late 60s with a Vietnam slant -- mine was more left-wing but otherwise they were pretty much the same -- and somewhere I have a set of Iraq War words that I knocked together a year or so back.