Pete Seeger
American Industrial Ballads
Smithsonian/Folkways CD SF 40058, 1992.
Liner notes on "Roll Down the Line":
"In the 1890s, in the mining country of eastern Tennessee, convict labor was used in
the mines to force the miners' union to accept company terms. Over a period of months
open warfare broke out between the miners and the National Guard. The miners
actually took over the mines and released the convicts. Eventually, the miners
were starved into submission and defeated in battle. Their leaders went to prison.
"This song, from the town of Coal Creek, comes from that intense struggle.
Apparently it is a miner's version of a song which was sung by the Negro convicts
who were working the mine. As presented here, it is from the singing of Uncle
David Macon, long a star on Nashville's Grand Old Opry radio program. Uncle Dave
was a young man at the time of the Coal Creek Rebellion, and probably learned the
song first hand."