THE BALLAD OF BIGFOOT WALLACE

[sloanrodgers]

[shadow=GREEN,left,400]THE BALLAD OF BIGFOOT WALLACE[/shadoW]Sloan Rodgers (c)

Gather all ye people, a story I will tell,
About a famous ranger, in Texas he did dwell.
Called Bigfoot Wallace to the end of his life,
He loved women and children, but never had a wife.

Bigfoot came to Texas in old republic days,
And with his trusty rifle served in many ways.
In every little skirmish and bloody battle ground,
There never was a tougher ranger found.

Riding into Austin in eighteen-thirty-nine,
Here he found a name, no one could malign.
Mistaken for an Indian in a dawn attack,
He took the chief's name and never gave it back.

Texas was invaded in eighteen-forty-two,
So Bigfoot joined the rangers to get a better view.
They had a little battle east of San Antone,
Rangers sent that army running for its home.

Craving Texas vengence for the invasion slight,
Rangers rode to Mier to give 'em another fight.
Captured and sentenced according to the law,
From a jar of beans all were forced to draw.

Bigfoot drew a white bean, while others drew the blacks,
They had another reason with the rifle cracks.
Swearing vows of vengeance for the martyred few,
This execution, there guards would one day rue.

Freed from Perote Castle in eighteen-forty-four,
Bigfoot and the rangers, now heroes of Texas lore.
Returning to their families and their hard fought lands,
Bigfoot and the Texans joined new ranger bands.

The message of this story is very clear to me,
Whether you're a ranger or a wannabe.
Rangers are tough and rangers are true,
But Bigfoot was the toughest, Texas ever knew.

[TRK]

I'm a little slow on the draw here, but I'm curious, RR: is this a recent composition? (The "wannabes" sure sounds "modern.") The lyrics paint a whole lot sunnier a picture of Wallace than that other ballad on Bigfoot, "William Wallace," credited to Dr. F. O. Ticknor and included in Duval's Adventures of Bigfoot Wallace. Suffice to say that Ticknor's verse was pretty much in keeping with certain racial attitudes of the times, and made Wallace look like some kind of a killing machine. ("curs and tyrants tremble / To come upon his track"; or "Grave as his own gun-barrel, / Yet gracious with the grim, / And when we pick a quarrel / We mustn't pick at him!")

[sloanrodgers]

trk said:

I'm a little slow on the draw here, but I'm curious, RR: is this a recent composition? (The "wannabes" sure sounds "modern.") The lyrics paint a whole lot sunnier a picture of Wallace than that other ballad on Bigfoot, "William Wallace," credited to Dr. F. O. Ticknor and included in Duval's Adventures of Bigfoot Wallace. Suffice to say that Ticknor's verse was pretty much in keeping with certain racial attitudes of the times, and made Wallace look like some kind of a killing machine. ("curs and tyrants tremble / To come upon his track"; or "Grave as his own gun-barrel, / Yet gracious with the grim, / And when we pick a quarrel / We mustn't pick at him!")

Yes, it's fairly new. Doc Ticknor's poem is certainly more brutal in imagery and meter, but not
very accurate historically. Of course it's just a poem and not expected to
be a history lesson. Rangers obviously weren't the only men to charge into
Mier in the Bigfoot ballad above.

[TRK]

After I first read John C. Duval's Adventures of Bigfoot Wallace some two score and seven years ago, I thought I could better Doc Ticknor's poetastry, and came up with my own "Ballad of Bigfoot Wallace." Coincidentally, mine also started off with the old cliche of a troubador's call to the populace to harken, and started off:

"Come gather 'round me people,
And a story I will tell
About a brave old Texian
Whose name you should know well.
They called him Bigfoot Wallace,
A Ranger brave and true..."

and that's all I remember; the rest was, well, poetastry.

[sloanrodgers]

That's catchy too. Hey! Are you really Troubador Kennedy???

[highplainsman]

I have a copy of Duvals book. Been awhile since I read it. I read somewhere, maybe in that book that Wallace was a decendent of the Scottish Patriot William Wallace. Anybody know if there is any truth in that?

[sloanrodgers]

It's just a story or wishful thinking. It's hard enough to trace one's
European ancestry back to the 16th century. Taking it to the Middle
Ages is almost impossible unless you're royalty. I don't believe there's
any real evidence that Sir William Wallace even had children, which I'm
sure is very frustrating to the folks that claim descent from this great
Scotsman.

[stuart]

None at all, in fact the traditional story runs that he took up arms after his wife or girlfriend, Marion Braidfute was murdered. Children are conspicuous by their absence both from legendary accounts of this incident and other stories attaching to him afterwards, although that certainly didn't stop all sorts of people claiming kinship. Colonel John Wallace, who commanded the Connaught Rangers during the Peninsular War was often referred to as a descendant.

[highplainsman]

I had also heard that Sir William died without any children. Can't remember offhand if he (Bigfoot) made the claim or someone else made it for him.

[sloanrodgers]

Bigfoot never claimed to be descended from the famed Scottish patriot, but
because Bigfoot was a noted fighter and ranger, many wished it was so. His
last biographer, Andrew J. Sowell did state that Bigfoot's Wallace family had
a "near" relationship to Sir William, but it's doubtful that they knew exactly
how they were related.