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I’m standing here in Dalton, Georgia
Looking back and looking east
I know there’s a big wide ocean
With the Blue Ridge Mountains between
My family roots run back to Scotland
Poor and hungry looking west
They sailed across the sea to Portland
And drifted south on another quest
Red mud of Georgia in my veins
Blood of the red man runs there too
Reservations …… relocations
The lies of the red white and blue
CH: The crofter and the Cherokee
Pushed out forced down on their knees
The clearances and the Trail of Tears
The crofter and the Cherokee
Burns said “a man’s a man for a’ that”
This state had ideals just the same
To treat all men fair and equal and a’ that
I hope someday we will again
A man who’s suffered to extreme ends
All too soon forgets his pain
He’ll justify profit by all means
He’ll keep a slave for his own gain
The Appalachian Trail is waiting
From Georgia up the coast to Maine
2000 miles of wild walking
To retrace my steps home again
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The boat comes in and she’s sitting low
They’ve had a good day’s fishing with a catch to show
But something’s wrong I can clearly see
Two fishermen when there should be three
Oh please god let it not be me
A widow made by the cruel sea
At last the oars touch the sand
I run up looking for my man
But all my fears were realised
They said a big sea pulled him ow’r the side
We’re heartfelt sorry for your loss
He was a fine young man as ever was
CH: I wish that I could leave this place
Break free of my widow’s chains
In the new world across the sea
An American I’d like to be
But I’ve one bairn he’s just one year
And a woman can’t do what she wants round here
My dead man’s brother holds the key
To what life has in store for me
When the men would talk I’d hear him say
How he would leave if he could one day
So I became a brother’s wife
I can’t complain for he treats me right
I know his heart he knows my mind
And he’s promised we will leave in time
And I use the gifts that god gave me
To keep him sweet as a man can be
Two years on and we crossed that sea
Where I lost my boy to a malady
We settled here in Portland Maine
And soon I’ll have a child again
Scotland is from where we came
But now we’re all Americans
CH: I wished that I could leave that place
I broke free of my widow’s chains
In the new world across the sea
An American I will always be
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3. |
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I soldiered for John Company
I killed for them and they paid me
A Highlander ‘neath a British flag
I served my time then packed my bags
The Appalachians marked the line
Where I lived free on the western side
I’ve killed white and I've killed red
To sleep at home in my Tennessee bed
CH: From the icy north of the Hudson Bay
To the southern shores of the Everglades
Peaks and valleys, fields and lakes
Where Old World rules and empire takes
I took oaths to king and queen
Promises I could not keep
For tyrant crown I do not stand
Now I’m an Overmountain Man
So when Ferguson marched his men
I joined and rode with Shelby then
In Carolina we fought and died
Loyalty on either side
My musket ball was one of seven
To claim the life of Ferguson
In Caroline we fought and died
The Battle of Kings Mountainside
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4. |
Song Notes
02:43
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5. |
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6. |
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Tinkers Tartan
My girl’s pale as pale can be
Eyes of grey like the cold north sea
And she always looks so fine to me
Wearing tinkers tartan
She loves the north wind in her hair
A morning frost in the autumn air
And when her arms and legs are bare
She’ll be wearing tinkers tartan
CH: She hides away from the summer sun
When the heats turned up she turns and runs
And the most I’ve ever seen her tan
Is a shade of tinkers tartan
She's got hair like a fairy queen
She's the prettiest thing I ever seen
She's a bonny lass in anything
But braw in tinkers tartan
A winter sunrise in her skin
With a hint of morning blue and pink
She's warm as wool and soft as silk
She’ll be wearing tinkers tartan
She wears the colours of her clan
All dressed in tinkers tartan
And I know that I’m a lucky man
When she's wearing tinker’s tartan
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Malcolm MacWatt London, UK
“MacWatt will doubtless be considered among the best of the new breed of folksingers and songwriters, who speak of the past
as a way to perhaps understand it and move forward” Stephen Rapid, Lonesome Highway
“He shines as a singer and he shines as an interpreter of the eternal folk songbook,” Tom Brosseau, The Great American Folk Show, North Dakota
... more
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