By RICK WAGNER
• “Kinnie Wagner”
Sung by Al (Altoona) Craver, alias of Vernon Dalhart, written by Andrew Jenkins and recorded Feb. 16, 1926.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rbdo_2sXeaM
https://adp.library.ucsb.edu/index.php/matrix/detail/2000031402/W141638-Kinnie_Wagner
Lyrics:
There was a man in Tennessee
Kinnie Wagner was his name
He got into bad company
And murderer he became
While down in Mississippi
The trouble it began
For Kinnie got a pistol there
And shot him down a man.
They put poor Kinnie in the jail
It was on one Christmas Day
There was no one to go his bail
But he made his getaway
He went to see his sister
Way up in Tennessee
And there they caught poor Kinnie
And took his liberty
They drove him to the river front
On one mild April day
And there poor Kinnie drew his gun
Too daring did he play
They took poor Kinnie back to jail
The judge to him did say
“Your sentence shall be death, my boy”
But Kinnie got away.
• “Kinnie Wagner’s Surrender”
The song was a follow-up to “Kinnie Wagner,” sung by Dalhart, written by Jenkins, recorded Sept. 13, 1926 and issued that year and in 1927. Another version was listed as by Craver. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9tPkUtrRA0
The same song was sung by Ernest Stoneman and recorded in 1927 and issued in that year and 1928. Aliases for Stoneman used on some releases were Uncle Jim Seany and Uncle Ben Hawkins.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5cYQr9FiSE
Lyrics:
I’m sure you’ve heard my story
From the Kinnie Wagner song,
How down in Mississippi
I took the road that’s wrong.
It was down in Mississippi
Where I murdered my first man,
When the sheriff there at Leachville
For justice took his stand.
Then I went from Mississippi
To the state of Tennessee,
Two men went down before me
As I took my liberty.
I wandered to the country,
I never could find rest,
’Til I went to Texarkana
Away out in the west.
Again I started drinking,
And again I pulled my gun,
And within a single moment
The deadly work was done.
The sheriff was a woman,
But she got the drop on me;
I quit the game and surrendered,
Gave up my liberty.
I’m now in Mississippi,
And I soon shall know my fate;
I’m waiting for my trial,
But I do not dread my fate.
For still the sun is shining,
The sky is blue and fair;
But my heart is not repining
For I do not fear the chair.
I’ve had my worldly pleasures,
I’ve faced a many a man,
But it was down in Texarkana
Where a woman called my hand.
Young men, young men, take warning,
Oh take my last advice:
If you start the game in life wrong
You must surely pay the price.
• “The Ballad of Kinnie Wagner”
This song was the last in a trilogy of sorts sung by Dalhart. It also was called “The Fate of Kinnie Wagner” sung by Craver (Dalhart) and Carson Robison. The Dalhart version was recorded Nov. 8, 1926.
https://archive.org/details/78_the-fate-of-kinnie-wagner_al-craver-robison_gbia0269871a/THE+FATE+OF+KINNIE+WAGNER+-+AL+CRAVER+-+Robison.flac
Lyrics:
It was down in Mississippi,
(or Way down in Mississippi)
Not many years ago,
A young man started out in life,
A life of sin and woe.
Now Kinnie Wagner was his name,
A bandit bold and free;
He shot down Sheriff McIntosh
And fled to Tennessee.
(or Then he went to Tennessee)
He was captured up in Tennessee
And put into the jail;
He had no one to help him out,
No one to go his bail.
But Kinnie broke the jail one night
And he made his getaway;
He thought that he could go through life
And never have to pay.
It was out in Texarkana
Where Kinnie met his fate;
A woman sheriff called his hand
And he pulled his gun too late.
He was taken back for trial
Right where the deed was done,
The judge to Kinnie turned and said,
“No more you’ll pull your gun.”
For Kinnie Wagner broke the law
And he threw his life away,
And right behind the prison bars
He’ll sit till judgment day.
So folks take fair warning
And heed this kind advice,
Don’t ever break the laws of God,
You’ll always have to pay.
Note that these songs stray from the facts and order of events in Wagner’s life from time to time. For instance, he turned himself in to the woman sheriff in Arkansas, and he turned himself in after the Tennessee shootings. Also, Wagner likely could not have received bail on a murder charge and the Mississippi killing was Christmas Eve after a November escape. In addition, it should be Leakesville instead of Leachville, although some versions list it as Leakesville. To further confuse things, the original Mississippi charges were from activities in George County, Mississippi, near Lucedale.
Altoona or Al Carver was a pseudonym for Marion Try Slaughter, but he was best known by the stage name Vernon Dalhart. In “Kennie Wagner’s Surrender,” listen to the song closely to hear Dalhart pronounce Mississippi in a drawn-out way. https://countrymusichalloffame.org/artist/vernon-dalhart/
Andrew Jenkins was a preacher who went blind in 1938. He wrote more than 800 songs and sang with his family. Many were about contemporary events and often had a moral of miniature sermon as the last verse. https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/arts-culture/andrew-jenkins-1885-1957
An FBI file gives Carson Robinson, an associate of Dalhart, credit for writing and singing one song. Robinson and Dalhart were musical partners for a while but later parted ways.
Ernest Stoneman https://secondhandsongs.com/artist/21507 helped Ralph Peer . https://birthplaceofcountrymusic.org/about/news/ralph-peer-display-at-the-museum-goes-beyond-the-bristol-sessions/ do the historic 1928 Bristol Sessions in Bristol, Tennessee, called the “Big Bang” of country music. Uncle Jim Seany and Uncle Ben Hawkins were pseudonyms for Stoneman.
Among those discovered in those sessions was The Carter Family, from Maces Springs or Hiltons, Virginia, in Scott County. The Carter descendants still live not too far from where Wagner grew up; where he turned himself in for the Kingsport killings in 1925; where he was recaptured after almost three years out of a Mississippi prison by the FBI in 1943; and where he was buried in 1958. However, The Carter Family never released a recording about Kinnie Wagner.
Sources: FBI memos from the 1940s, online music archives, folkorist.org, murderpedia, thepastwhispers.com, fresnostate.edu and the links to the song recordings.
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