Women raising hell I find have always cast a spell
I will tell of some I know and you might know as well
People called them red they say but that’s all right by me
All they did was point the way to make the world more free
Florence Reece was one of those - she helped the striking men
From the heart she wrote a dart that flew straight from her pen
Harlan County USA in 1931
Florence wrote her famous song - asked “Which Side Are You On?”
Chorus:
Rebel girls, girls, girls - Rebel girls, girls, girls
Rebel girls, girls, girls and union maids
Rebel girls, girls, girls - Rebel girls, girls, girls
Rebel girls, girls, girls and union maids
Mary Harris Jones was born with protest in her bones
Miner’s angel to the men who dug coal mining stones
Mother Jones they called her for she led the picket line
Facing up to thugs with guns at every striking mine
Mother to the silk mill slaves - the kids who were ill-used
Marched some up to Roosevelt to show they were abused
Ludlow up to Washington she fought for all who live
Rode her train and raised some Cain and always sought to give
Chorus:
Hazel Dickens sprung to life from West Virginia soil
She left Mercer County and the miners’ life of toil
Turned her feelings into songs defiant straight & plain
Truth can be a lethal tool when forged by years of pain
In a lonesome bluegrass voice that pierced the hearer’s soul
Hazel Dickens sang her songs of hardship wrought by coal
Never Keep Us Down she sang a pretty bird flies free
No more women’s calloused hands the prize for slavery
Chorus:
Molly Jackson, Sarah Gunning rebels to the core
Molly Jackson was supposed to rob a grocery store
To feed hungry kids she said and left an I.O.U
That’s the story she put out and I hope that it’s true
Molly’s sister Sarah Gunning sang about hard times
Starving children constant sorrow East Kentucky mines
Rebel girl a mountain pearl a wild bird in a cage
Took a life of toil and strife and sung it out on-stage
