Blue Highway - Wild Bill Lyrics

(Tim Stafford/Daniel House Music, BMI)

He rode out from Old Fort Hays alone
Thinkin’ ’bout the one left behind but not for long
Then he was gone

James Butler Hickock was his name
He never knew just why they called him “Bill”
or “Wild,” since he never liked to kill

The youngest son of a Baptist preacher man
His mother said “Don’t take up the gun
or you’re always on the run”

“Don’t go James,” she cried
and he told her that he wouldn’t but he lied
“I’m looking for my fortune and it ain’t in Illinois
but they say that farther West it’s open wide”

So he started off across the endless plains
and he soon became a jack of every trade
But some men are born not made

Nichols came to Springfield riding high
looking for a dime-store Galahad
but Bill was all he had

Six foot three in a tall Prince Albert frock
He let his blond hair flow down behind
Two ivory-handled pistols at his side

The lies they built a legend ’round his head
They stared at him like the Son of God come down
That usually meant a good night on the town

Agnes Lake was a beauty so they say
She rendezvoused with Bill in old Cheyenne
and soon he won her hand

Nearly blind he married her that spring
Their love like fragrant blossoms grew
But deep inside she knew

“Don’t go Bill,” she cried
and he told her that he wouldn’t but he lied
“We could make a fortune in the Black Dakota Hills
where a reputation keeps a man alive”
But she never saw that man again alive

Jack McCall was a drifter and a bum
He shot Bill in the back of the head
Aces and eights the dead man’s hand

The legend and the man are not the same
but the man died in Deadwood all alone
The legend still lives on