River's getting higher, awash folks only land
Banks are folding slowly, brown water's spitting sand
Turn me loose big river, old man flow to the sea
I'm stuck here on Mud Island and the Union's hunting me
I left my home Magnolia - my Daddy's rusty gun
Mama tried to hold me there she said I'm her only sun
We hit 'em hard in Memphis - Four yankees to our one
But slowly all my kinfolk died and now I'm on the run
I hear the gunboats thunder, with voices on the decks
And the candlelights of Memphis make a hundred tiny specks
I'm hungry as a gator as I wait here in the cold
There's something in the stars that say I'll die before I'm old
If I get off this sandbar I'm shoving to the south
I'll swim this mighty river til it spits me from its mouth
There ain't a rebel living that's a shiverin' like this
I'm wishing for my home back down in southern Miss.