It was early spring time that the strike was on   They moved us miners out of doors   Out from the houses that the company owned   We moved into tents at old Ludlow      I was worried bad about my children   Soldiers guarding the railroad bridge   Every once in a while a bullet would fly   Kick up gravel under my feet      We were so afraid they would kill our children   We dug us a cave that was seven foot deep   Carried our young ones and a pregnant woman   Down inside the cave to sleep      That very night, you soldier waited   Until us miners were asleep   You snuck around our little tent town   Soaked our tents with your kerosene      You struck a match and the blaze it started   You pulled the triggers of your Gatling guns   I made a run for the children   But the fire wall stopped me   Thirteen children died from your guns      I carried my blanket to a wire fence corner   Watched the fire 'til the blaze died down   I helped some people grab their belongings   While your bullets killed us all around      I will never forget the looks on the faces   Of the men and women that awful day   When we stood around to preach their funerals   And lay the corpses of the dead away      We told the Colorado governor to call the President   Tell him to call off his National Guard   But the National Guard belong to the governor   So he didn't try so very hard      Our women from Trinidad they hauled some potatoes   Up to Walsenburg in a little cart   They sold their potatoes and brought some guns back   And put a gun in every hand      The state soldiers jumped us in a wire fence corner   They did not know that we had these guns   And the redneck miners mowed down them troopers   You should have seen those poor boys run      We took some cement and walled that cave up   Where you killed those thirteen children inside   I said, "God bless the Mine Workers' Union"   And then I hung my head and cried