Just after Appomattox, two last bullets and a bell
For the honest and the actor, that the tragic curtain fell
There beneath the flood of headlights in the Mississippi spray
The wreck of the Sultana lies, buried to this day
Buried to this day, boys

The Sultana was a steamboat, she made a New Orleans-Cairo run
When a greedy Captain Mason heard that since the war is done
And the Union POWs are free now, Uncle Sam
Is paying for their passage home, five dollars every man

"Well, that's four a head," the captain said, calculating, calm
A dollar per to the officer should grease the Judas palm
So on a steamboat meant to carry 350 with crew
2300 herded, a huddled multitude

Of purple scars and leather shadows, mid-tattered, stitched, and torn
What little's always left of glory's human uniform
A human uniform, boys

And when you figure in civilian men, women, children too
That's 500 more, plus the horses, cargo, coal, and crew
And so it was and it wasn't the numbers that night
You see, the boiler needed grave repairs
But the captain had rushed a patch job
As not to lose one precious fare
And so, asleep, afloat beneath a sleepy Memphis sky
It came to pass, a flame, a flash
And Death, she opened wide

And the force of the blast took the fortunate
Fast asleep, dreams to dust
But the rest awoke, chest to boat
With the thunder and the thrust

As the smokestack smashed through the upper decks, a screaming axehead fell
And a splintered rain of men and flames, pinned in a crush of hell
And diving in, the drowning men and tangled acres roar
Their frantic limbs heavy in the anesthetic cold

And it was swollen, that's a solace
The river reaped her spoils
As a stony moon stared on and on
Where the general eye recoils

Until the morning sun rose warm upon the lucky, living through
The hell and the high water Mason steered them straight into
Now I ain't sayin' the captain's evil. I ain't sayin' he's any good
Just wherever he stood to profit, that's where he stood

He may have stood 'til the flames forked over
Paid dearly what the river pulls down
But all accounts'll tell you
How his body was never found
It was the end of the Sultana, the end of many good men as well
So for now I'll end the story they couldn't count on time to tell
Though deadlier than the Titanic's legendary fall
I guess it's less romantic; mostly soldiers after all

More dead than Shiloh, Chickamauga, and others lesser known
More anthems send a soldier off than ever sing him home
Than ever sing him home, boys