ALICE MITCHELL AND FREDDY WARD
Sung by: Mrs. Grace Hastings
Recorded in Memphis, TN 8/19/60

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You-all have heard of Freddy Ward,
Who lived many miles from town.
While walking down the stone pavement,
Alice Mitchell cut her down.

She says she killed her because she loved her,
But love was not the thing,
For Alice and Freddy both loved the same man,
And she taken her life for him.

They put her on an eastbound train,
With arms strong tightly bound down.
And every town that she would pass through,
You could hear those people say:

"There goes that Alice Mitchell,
With arms strong tightly bound down,
For the crime she did in Memphis,
She's bound for Bolivar now.

"And they won't do anything to her--
She has two of the best lawyers in town--
But if they served Alice Mitchell right,
They would simply cut her down."

(Dr. Wolf: "Mrs. Hastings' mother and Freddy Ward were girlfriends. She learned the song from her mother when she was living at Ashport, Tennessee, near Ripley. The murder took place on Front Street at Poplar, where the old station used to be. Freddy Ward got her throat cut by Alice Mitchell when the two were saying goodbye to one another. Freddy Ward at that time lived at Ripley.")

All Songs Recorded by John Quincy Wolf, Jr., unless otherwise noted

The John Quincy Wolf Folklore Collection
Lyon College, Batesville, Arkansas
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