Lyrics: Colter Wall
Music: Colter Wall
Wild Bill was born in Illinois, on dry, infertile land
Pioneer of pistoleers, and a dead shot with each hand
Claimed he was the quickest, there's few who'd ill-agree
Fewer yet to saw his plainsman draw, still breath like you and me
He led a stagecoach freight team in his early days of life
One evening on the western trail, Bill took the air of night
Who should come upon him, but a bear whom he'd awoke?
Wild Bill produced his bowie knife and fashioned a new coat
The Kansas prairies he knew well, and wild Missouri too
Come 1861, Bill donned the union blue
For not unlike his daddy, he'd see no man in bonds
Every man in Jimmy Lane's brigade, of Hickok they were fond
While a marshal in Abilene, many Texans came to call
Phil Coe told John Wes Hardin, "Wild Bill has got to fall
He's a cruel and brutish yankee, and if you don't, then I will"
Wild Bill put down Phil Coe and Wes Hardin's livin' still
He met his fate in Deadwood, inside Tom Nuttal's place
Amidst a game of poker, holdin' aces and two eights
When up stepped from behind him, the coward Jack McCall
A slug ripped through his auburn hair, old Wild Bill never saw