This poem was the only one written by Davy Crockett after he lost the Congressional election to Adam Huntsman.
He said: “I had Mr. Adam Huntsman for my competitor, aided by the popularity of both Andrew Jackson and Governor Carroll, and the whole strength of the Union Bank at Jackson.”…”The thorn still rankles, not so much on my own account, as the Nation’s.”…”I told them that I had been knocked down and dragged out, and that I did not consider it a fair fight anyhow they could fix it. I put the ingredients in the cup pretty strong, I tell you, and I concluded my speech by telling them that I was done with politics for the present, and that they might all go to hell, and I would go to Texas.”
Were more beautiful far than Eden could be;
No fruit was forbidden, but Nature had spread
Her bountiful board, and her children were fed.
The hills were our garners — our herds wildly grew,
And Nature was shepherd and husbandman too.
I felt like a monarch, yet thought like a man,
As I thank’d the Great Giver, and worshipped his plan.
The home I forsake where my offspring arose:
The graves I forsake where by children repose,
The home I redeem’d from the savage and wild;
The home I have loved as a father his child;
The corn that I planted, the fields that I cleared,
The flocks that I raised and the cabin I rear’d;
The wife of my bosom — Farewell to ye all!
In the land of the stranger I rise — or I fall.
Farewell to my country! — I fought for thee well,
When the savage rushed forth like the demons from hell.
In peace or in war I have stood by thy side —
My country for thee I have lived — would have died!
But I am cast off– My career now has run,
And I wander abroad like the prodigal son —
Where the wild savage roves, and the broad prairies spread,
The fallen despised — will again go ahead!
Ancestral Notes by Earline Hines Bradt is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.
Filed under: Davy Crockett
Ancestral Notes 