The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #24157   Message #273366
Posted By: Joe Offer
07-Aug-00 - 11:48 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Add: Cotton Mill Girls
Subject: Lyr Add: COTTON MILL GIRLS^^
Here's another version:

COTTON MILL GIRLS

I worked in the cotton mill all of my life,
And I ain't got nothing but a Barlow knife,
It's hard times, cotton mill girls,
It's hard times everywhere.

CHORUS
It's hard times cotton mill girls,
It's hard times cotton mill girls,
It's hard times cotton mill girls,
It's hard times everywhere.

In nineteen fifteen we heard it said,
"Move to the country and get ahead."
It's hard times cotton mill girls,
It's hard times everywhere.
CHORUS

Us kids worked twelve hours a day
For fourteen cents of measly pay.
It's hard times cotton mill girls,
It's hard times everywhere.
CHORUS

When I die, don't bury me at all,
Just hang me up on the spinning room wall,
Pickle my bones in alcohol,
It's hard times everywhere.
CHORUS

(source: Jerry Silverman's Folk Song Encyclopedia)

JRO^^
Note: There's a version in Here's to the Women (Wenner & Freilicher, 1987). It's almost exactly the same as what's in the Silverman book. Silverman gives no attribution, and Wenner/Freilicher say the song is traditional.