Brendan Calling

True Song

Poor Ellen Smith how she was found
Shot through the heart lying cold on the ground
Her clothers were all scattered and thrown on the ground
And blood marks the spot where poor Ellen was found

They picked up their rifles and hunted me down
And found me a-loafing in Mount Airy town
They picked up the body and carried it away
And now she is sleeping in some lonesome old grave

I got a letter yesterday and I read it today
The flowers on her grave have all faded away
Some day I’ll go home and say when I go
On poor Ellen’s grave pretty flowers I’ll sow

I’ve been in this prison for twenty long years
Each night I see Ellen through my bitter tears
The warden just told me that soon I’ll be free
To go to her grave near that old willow tree

My days in this prison are ending at last
I’ll never be free from the sins of my past
Poor Ellen Smith how she was found
Shot through the heart lying cold on the ground

Poor Ellen Smith

Poor Ellen Smith is what we call a “true song”: like the crimes detailed in Tom Dooley, Ellen Smith really was murdered, and in today’s New York Times, Dan Barry interviews the family of her alleged killer, Peter De Graff:

One hundred fifteen years ago this month, on open land now occupied by warehouses and office buildings, a bantam of a man mounted the gallows built in his dishonor. He raised his hat and bowed before the 6,000 people gathered to see the floor beneath him drop. He carried a small Bible.

A trial six months earlier had laid out how this ne’er-do-well of 22, Peter DeGraff, had charmed a poor, simple woman named Ellen Smith. How she followed him around town like a puppy after their child was lost at birth. How he avoided her, accused her of being with other men, muttered that he’d like to kill her. How he sent her a note fraught with misspellings one day, sweetly requesting she meet him by a spring close to where people now play tennis, down the hill from the Zinzendorf Hotel, long gone.

How he shot her through the heart, his gun so close that its powder singed the outfit she had chosen for what she thought would be a romantic reconciliation. How she was not yet 20.

DeGraff fled for a while, but eventually returned to town for reasons unknown and was captured. All the while he maintained his innocence, even though his sweet note had been found tucked in the bosom of poor Ellen Smith.

The story goes that deGraff write “Poor Ellen Smith” while in jail awaiting execution, set to the tune of “How Firm a Foundation”. For years it was illegal to sing or perform the song in Winston-Salem’s boundaries.

Wilma Lee and Stoney Cooper

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