| Buy DocSouth Books
Little Mary Phagan:
Electronic Edition.
Performed by Rosa Lee Carson
Funding from the Institute for Museum and Library Services supported the electronic publication of this title.
Text transcribed by
Monique Prince
Text encoded by
Elizabeth S. Wright
First edition, 2003
ca. 7K
Academic Affairs Library, UNC-CH
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,
2003.
Source Description:
(song title) Little Mary Phagan
Songwriter:
Performer: Rosa Lee Carson
1 p.
Call number 78-15479 General Collection/Sound Recordings (#30001), (Southern Folklife Collection, Manuscripts Department, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)
The electronic edition is a part of the UNC-CH digitization project, Documenting the American South.
The text has been encoded using the recommendations for Level 4 of the TEI in Libraries Guidelines.
These song lyrics are transcribed from a recording from the Southern Folklife Collection, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. They accompany an audio file, available at /nc/littlemary/menu.html
All quotation marks, em dashes and ampersand have been transcribed as entity references.
All double right and left quotation marks are encoded as " and " respectively.
Spell-check and verification made against printed text using Author/Editor (SoftQuad) and Microsoft Word spell check programs.
Library of Congress Subject Headings
Languages Used:
- English
LC Subject Headings:
Revision History:
- 2004-12-08,
Celine Noel and Wanda Gunther
revised TEIHeader and created catalog record for the electronic edition.
-
2003-09-11,
Elizabeth S. Wright,
finished TEI-conformant encoding and final proofing.
-
2003-08-21,
Elizabeth S. Wright
finished TEI/SGML encoding
- 2003-07-17,
Monique Prince
finished transcribing the text.
Little Mary Phagan
Audio File (MP3 file, ca. 3.3 MB, 3:34 min)
Return to Menu Page for Little Mary Phagan by Rosa Lee Carson Return to The North Carolina Experience Home Page Return to Documenting the American South Home Page
Little Mary Phagan, she went to town one day
She went to the pencil fact'ry, to get her little pay
She left her home at eleven, when she kissed her mother good-bye
Not one time did the po' child think, she was goin' right to die
Leo Frank met her, with a blues we hardly know
He smiled and said, "Lil' Mary, now you go home no mo'"
He sneaked along behind her, 'til she reached the little room
He laughed and said, "Lil' Mary, you met your fatal doom."
She fell upon her knees, to Leo Frank she pled
Because she was virtuous, he hit her across the head
The tears rolled down her rosy cheeks, the blood flowed down her back
She remembered tellin' her mother what time she would be back
He killed lil' Mary Phagan, was on one holiday
Then called for ol' Jim Conley to take her body away
He took her to the basement, bound hand and feet
Down in the basement, lil' Mary lay asleep
Newt Lee was the watchman, when he went to wind the key
Down in the basement, lil' Mary he could see
He called for the officers, their names I do not know
They came to the pencil factr'y, saying, "Newt Lee, you must go."
They took him to the jailhouse, locked him in a cell
The poor ol' innocent nigger, knew nothin' for to tell
I have a notion in my head, when Frank comes to die
He took his damnation in the courthouse in the sky
The astonished asked the question, the angels they do say
Why he kill lil' Mary, upon one holiday?
Come all of you good people, wherever you may be,
Supposin' little Mary belonged to you or me?
Her mother sets a-weepin'
She weeps and mourns all day
She prays to meet her baby
In a better world some day
Judge Roan passed the sentence
You bet he passed it well
Solicitor Hugh M. Dorsey
Sent Leo Frank to ——