Tom Horn

These two songs were printed some years back, when I was in Salt Lake City, in a pamphlet known as The New Revised 75 cent Song Book. Both songs were made up with traditional tunes in mind, but as I never did sing either of them much, I though they might need tunes other than the ones I came up with. They're good stories that ought to be heard, so we decided to print just the words, and leave it up to you to dig up the tune. If you happen to find a tune or make up one you especially like, send it along to me care of Wooden Shoe. By the way, the introductions are taken straight out of The New Revised 75 cent Song Book.
Wrapped this one up while I was searching around for an envelope. The story is mentioned in an old WPA manuscript where I first read it. The details, though, are taken from the telling of a Dagget County boy whose grandfather was an invalid and spent his declining years amusing his relatives with stories and tall tales about the big drives from Texas to Wyoming and Montana. This fellow was a little under the weather when I got this story, as we had been drinking most of the afternoon over at the Parlor on State Street. But it doesn't matter whether or not the story is a true one, as long as it is his story or his grandfather's story. As much as possible, I would like to write these songs just the way my informants would have if they were songwriters, all the way down to using phrases and catch words that I would not normally use in a Song myself. In this song, for instance, I got the story down pretty much word for word; I've just rearranged some of the phrasing and added in some rhyme words until his conversation comes out in verse form. Then I sang the song at him until I came up with a tune that he knew and also fit the words. This song goes to the tune of "Little Joe the Wrangler". If you're using the old one, then the tune stays the same all the way through. If you're using the later one, the same one used for "Little Joe the Wrangler's Sister Nell", then the tune changes every other verse, which is a good idea since there are 14 of them.

Gather 'round you cowboys and pull up to the fire,
And I'll commence to tell you all a tale
Of Tom Horn the rustler and gun-fighter you all know,
And the time he rode out on the outlaw trail.

Now I know his reputation won't bear too close a look,
But hold your fire until my story's through,
And I will tell you how there was a great injustice done,
I'll swear right now that every word is true.

It was up in old Brown's Park not so very long ago,
By the river that we sometimes call the Bear,
Where the outlaws came to hole up and hide out from the law,
And they used to brand their stolen cattle there.

The Tracy-Lant killers and wild Butch Cassidy,
The boys from Powder Springs were all there, too;
Though the marshals went in after and some came out alive,
You know they must have buried quite a few.

Now the big Association had lost so many steers
It was certain that the lawmen had all failed,
For not a single outlaw had ever been strung up,
While their friends were there to bust them out of jail.

So young Tom Horn was called in to hire out his gun,
And go up there and clean those rustlers out.
Though he was not as famous as some other names you've heard,
He was the fastest in his day without a doubt.

Well, he rode up the Uintas into the outlaw town,
And there he joined up with that rustler band.
He rode with them at Rawlins and down along the Green,
But he was careful not to show his hand.

But one by one the outlaws began to disappear,
While riding out to check the herd at night.
It was Tom Horn who met them and called them to account,
For none could stand against him in a fight.

So pretty soon the rustlers grew scarce and hard to find,
And those who were still living drifted on.
And the big Association sent a message up by wire,
"Good work, and now your job with us is done."

But they did not want it known that they had hired a gun
To do a job the marshals could not do,
So they paid him off in Rawlins and told him not to tell
This secret that was known by just a few.

Well, he rode into Cheyenne and entered the saloon,
And there they jumped him, twenty men or more.
The ranchers of that valley, they knew the rustler hand,
And everyone had seen his face before.

The sheriffs would not listen, they laughed and said he lied;
His reputation there was known too well.
Though they wired to Routt County on the chance he might be right,
The cattlemen who hired him would not tell.

So they put him in the jailhouse, but he never came to trial,
For a lynching mob broke in and took him down.
They strung him to the rafters until his neck was broke,
And they dumped his body at the edge of town.

And this is the true story of how Tom Horn was killed,
It happened at the hands of honest men.
Though his gun had brought the outlaws to a quick and painless end,
He never got the chance he gave to them.

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