Well, now, I'm out here under guard tonight   I wear the ball and chain   Joined up to fight the Yankee cavalry   Oh, we got here cold and hungry   Then they marched us through the rain   And I was thinkin' 'bout you then, my Rose Marie   Oh, the cannonballs, the bayonets   The bloody battle cry   Oh, there's nothin' but these days of misery   And when those Yankees got me on the wire   I could hear the bullets fly   And I was thinkin' of you then, my Rose Marie   Seems like a thousand summers past   Oh, since we rode that circus wheel   And kissed there at the top   For all to see   But now outside there is a firing squad   And now they're servin' me up my last meal   And I was thinking of you then   Oh, my Rose Marie   Two guards walked me to that prison wall,   The preacher reads a prayer   But your face is all of heaven that I see   And as they tie that blindfold on   I see the sky and taste the air   And I'm thinkin' of you then, my Rose Marie   Oh now I can hear the rifle triggers cockin' back   And the order shouted out   Oh, but I feel there's somethin' wrong here, now   Please, Lord, let it be   Oh, all around us bombs exploding, shells are dropping here   From the army to the south   And then a corporal cut the ropes there on my wrists   And I was free   I was thinkin' about you then, my Rose Marie   I marched back with all the others   That had proudly wore the gray   Finally made it back here home to Tennessee   But all they said was that you'd married   And you had moved away   And I was thinkin' of you then, my Rose Marie   Now years have passed, I'm still alone   No new one to desire   Still starin' into flames of memory   I see circus wheels, and summers,   And a face there in the fire   And I'm thinkin' of you now, my Rose Marie   My Rose Marie