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Last update, Aug 25, 2010

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Charlie Siringo: written by Mike Blakely

Album: Ride The River
Artist biography

Charlie Siringo was a real cowboy who became a Pinkerton detective after several years of herding cattle. Read more about Charlie Siringo W

  • Cayuse: Slang name for a horse, sometimes used in referring to a problem horse or a horse that is well liked. Also a specific breed called the Cayuse Indian Pony
  • Fandango: Style of folk music and dance. More W
  • Gringo: Slang for a cowboy, usually referring to a Mexican cowboy, normally used in a friendly manner
  • Hole In The Wall Gang: An outlaw gang of the American west.

You can preview and purchase Charlie's book "A Texas Cowboy: or, Fifteen Years on the Hurricane Deck of a Spanish Pony" from Amazon, just click on the graphic to the right


O Charlie Siringo was
Just nineteen years old
In eighteen and seventy five

Hell bent on pushing
His luck with them longhorns W
Up north on the Chisholm trail drive W

He told his dear mother
He promised to squander
No wages on women and wine

But Charlie Siringo
Should never have made no
Big promises he couldn't mind

Now Charlie spent fifteen
Long years on the hurricane
Deck of a Spanish cayuse

Till the boss found out
That bobbed wire worked cheaper than Charlie
And up and cut old Charlie loose

He drifted to Kansas and tended a store
But three years was more than he could stand
So Charlie Siringo rode up to Chicago
And became a Pinkerton man

Old Charlie Siringo he loved a fandango
And no one can argue with that
He would ride in a minute
For the pure glory in it
Then he'd fight at the drop of a hat

That wild Texas gringo, Charlie Siringo
He rounded them up mighty fine
And I am a friend of old Charlie Siringo
And Charlie's an old friend of mine

Now Charlie Siringo rode down through Durango
In the summer of eighteen ninety nine
Hot on the trail of some bad desperados
Wanted over the Wyoming line

The Hole In The Wall Gang W
Had blowed up a pay train
And gotten away with the dough
Charlie spent months on the trail of a wild bunch
But let old Butch Cassidy go W

And Charlie Siringo he loved a fandango
And no one can argue with that
He would ride in a minute
For the pure glory in it
Then he'd fight at the drop of a hat

That wild Texas gringo Charlie Siringo
He rounded them up mighty fine
And I am a friend of old Charlie Siringo
And Charlie's an old friend of mine

Now Charlie Siringo was fifty one years old
In the summer of nineteen ought six
After twenty two years as a cowboy detective
He figured he'd just call it quits

Now old Charlie understood
He needed livelihood
He couldn't get by on his looks
So Charlie remembered
His wild west adventures
And wrote 'em all down in his book

And now Charlie Siringo he loves a fandango
And no one can argue with that
He will ride in a minute
For the pure glory in it
Then he'll fight at the drop of a hat

That wild Texas gringo, Charlie Siringo
He rounded 'em up mighty fine
And I am a friend of old Charlie Siringo
And Charlie's an old friend of mine

That's why I'm a friend of old Charlie Siringo
And Charlie's an old friend of mine


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