Ricky Skaggs - Charlie & Johnny Reb lyrics

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Looking back at a page in time

The year was 1859

We ran deep in the souther pines

'Neath that Alabama Clay

Charlie and Johnny were brothers in blood

Nothing stronger than family love

The cotton was short and times were tough

So they went through seperate ways

Charlie moved north to work in corn

But Johnny he stayed south

And after being apart a couple of years

Civil war broke out

Well both of the brothers they were volunteers

After fighting each other for all those years

But if it came to fighting they had no fears

They had seen their share of fists

Then they got the news how it would be

The brothers had agreed to disagree

Is like taking an axe to the family tree

Never dreamed it would come to this

Charlie put on the union blue

And Johnny the rebel grey

But each one pray his brother'd live

The fight another day

As dawn was breaking on the battle field

Through the canon smoke and the foggy hills

A shot rang out from the cold blue steele

Charlie held in his shakin' hands

And after the fight while countin' the cost

There was more that day than a battle lost

When under a tree line in the moss

Charlie came upon a young man

And as he wiped the mud and blood away

It took more than his breath

'Cause the soldier in his sights that day

Was his brother Johnny Reb