Pinhook

Written by Kirk Hawley

There's trouble back east over there in Delores
And trouble down south on the San Juan they say
And trouble for the cowboys down by the Blue Mountains
You'd think you would know when it's headed your way.

Thirty good men from Delores and Rico
Some wouldn't see their families again
Chased the Indians up Elk Mountain to Pinhook
And up by Horse Creek the fighting began.

Those boys from Colorado, outgunned and outnumbered,
They fought through the night and they fought through the day.
We heard the shots and we banded together
A man's got to help out wherever he may.

We rode up together to where Pack Creek heads north
And we rode up the gully and spoke not a word
We thought we would hear those rifles a-blazing
As we climbed up to Pinhook not a sound could be heard.

We found what was left of those men from Delores
After searching all day through the oak and the pines
Twenty men living and ten with their maker
Two of them sons of a good friend of mine.

They must have been up there just tending their cattle
And them and the Indians had always been close
But this was the same ones that shot poor Joe Wilson
And friends don't mean nothing to men such as those.

We'll take up these men and wrap them in blankets
And lay them to rest down deep in the clay
And pack up our shovels and ride back to town
And tell Jane Wilson where her sons' bodies lay.