Where the broad Savannah flows along to meet the mighty sea
There stood a peaceful village that meant all the world to me.
'Twas the home of happy people, I knew each and every one
My kin folk and all the friends I loved, the town was Ellenton.
But the military came one day and filled our hearts with woe.
"We'll study war right here," they said, "The little town must go."
Then they came with trucks and dynamite, the din and dust rose high.
I stood and gazed in silence as I watched my hometown die.
Then they brought bulldozers by the score where children used to play
Pushed over all the trees we loved, and scraped the flowers away.
Now the homes are gone, the schoolhouse too, the sweat and toil of years
And with them all the joys and hopes of past and future years.
The little church was hauled away, the fields are brown and bare
And in their place a mighty plant - they build the H-bomb there.
Now the smoke hangs o'er the valley like the mist before my eyes
Tht has been there ever since the day I saw my hometown die
Oh, the friends we know and love, we'll meet upon some other shore
For Ellenton - fair Ellenton - is gone forevermore.
There stood a peaceful village that meant all the world to me.
'Twas the home of happy people, I knew each and every one
My kin folk and all the friends I loved, the town was Ellenton.
But the military came one day and filled our hearts with woe.
"We'll study war right here," they said, "The little town must go."
Then they came with trucks and dynamite, the din and dust rose high.
I stood and gazed in silence as I watched my hometown die.
Then they brought bulldozers by the score where children used to play
Pushed over all the trees we loved, and scraped the flowers away.
Now the homes are gone, the schoolhouse too, the sweat and toil of years
And with them all the joys and hopes of past and future years.
The little church was hauled away, the fields are brown and bare
And in their place a mighty plant - they build the H-bomb there.
Now the smoke hangs o'er the valley like the mist before my eyes
Tht has been there ever since the day I saw my hometown die
Oh, the friends we know and love, we'll meet upon some other shore
For Ellenton - fair Ellenton - is gone forevermore.
Contributed by Bernart Bartleby - 2017/10/1 - 22:02
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Scritta da tal D. Smith (?) e da Jesse “Pa” Johnson, fondatore e leader di questo gruppo corale bianco americano degli anni 40.
Nel repertorio di folksingers come Rosalie Sorrels, scomparsa di recente, nel giugno scorso, e come The New Lost City Ramblers
La cittadina di Ellenton, South Carolina, non ha avuto un bel destino. Negli anni successivi alla Guerra Civile fu teatro di sanguinosissimi scontri tra gruppi paramilitari suprematisti, legati al Partito Democratico (!), e militanti del Partito Repubblicano - quello del presidente Ulysses S. Grant, ex condottiero nordista – una parte del quale si batteva per la protezione e l'inclusione sociale degli schiavi liberati.
Poi nel 1950 la cittadina fu interamente evacuata e cancellata dalle mappe perchè il governo aveva deciso di costruire proprio lì un grande impianto nucleare, il Savannah River Plant, destinato all'arricchimento del plutonio per le bombe-H. Circa 6.000 persone furono costrette ad abbandonare tutto. Alcune di loro fondarono una New Ellenton ad una ventina di chilometri a nord.