Hardin Wouldn't Run

(album: Sings The Ballads Of The True West - 1965)

I know a man whose plow handle hand is quicker than a light
Wes Hardin is his name they say he travels in the night
For he might have to kill or walk around a fight

And if you ever saw Wes Hardin draw you know he can skin his gun
He won't say how many tried and died
Up against the top hand up against the wrong man cause Harding wouldn't run

He rode in like a Texas wind took the eastbound train
Going going with Jane Bowen till the law men caught up
So long Janie chin up I'll be back again

Off he went to Huntsville Prison so long Janie he cried
Fifteen years she waited till her heart broke and she died
And she left that bad land to wait up in the sky

Free at last the paying past for all the wrong he did
First free air they let him breathe since he was a kid
So let him come and let him go and let him deal and bid

Near the border in El Paso Lawyer reads the sign
You won't find him there for business every day at nine
For business is real bad one client's all he's had in quite a long long time

Then sheriff Selman's boy broke in to Wes's woman's place
Up she jumped and pistol whipped him kicked him in the face
And John Selman demands revenge for this disgrace

You could see every night by candlelight in Hardin's favorite bar
She'd be hanging on his arm and very late they'd leave there
Headed for the Goose Hair glad it wasn't far

Right through the swinging doors John Selman came with a blazing gun
Wes Hardin chug-a-lugging red eye got him in the back of the head
John Wesley Hardin fell dead cos Hardin wouldn't run