Dark and Bloody Ground

This land was ours far as the eye could see We took it from the Cherokee with a scalping knife And a white man's disease When the smallpox ravaged their towns We came in and burnt them down And took this dark and bloody ground This dark and bloody ground This dark and bloody ground I took a prisoner 'cause I needed a wife I broke her will she gave me a son I spared her life It was a fate much worse than death Yeah we were kissed by the devil's breath Set down on this dark and bloody ground This dark and bloody ground This dark and bloody ground We'll lay our bodies down Put 'em six feet in the ground And when the long cold winter ends Oh the sun comes shinin' in The crops will grow again In this dark and bloody ground They gave me three hundred dollars Put a pen in my hand I was drunk on corn liquor I signed the rights away to my land The coal company tore my homestead down Ripped the black gold from the ground Left a hole in this dark and bloody ground This dark and bloody ground This dark and bloody ground If Jesus was born in Kentucky They'd make him pay for his nails Worse yet he'd have to work off his debt Down here in this hell Where they pay you off in company scrip And your life it don't mean shit Just a piece of this dark and bloody ground This dark and bloody ground This dark and bloody ground I will lay my body down Put me six feet in the ground And when the long cold winter ends The sun comes shinin' in And the crops will grow again