This is a hauntingly beautiful song about introspection, specifically about looking back at a relationship that started bad and ended so poorly, that the narrator wants to go back to the very beginning and tell himself to not even travel down that road. I believe that the relationship started poorly because of the lines:
"Take me back to the night we met:When the night was full of terrors: And your eyes were filled with tears: When you had not touched me yet"
So, the first night was not a great start, but the narrator pursued the relationship and eventually both overcame the rough start to fall in love with each other:
"I had all and then most of you"
Like many relationships that turn sour, it was not a quick decline, but a gradual one where the narrator and their partner fall out of love and gradually grow apart
"Some and now none of you"
Losing someone who was once everything in your world, who you could confide in, tell your secrets to, share all the most intimate parts of your life, to being strangers with that person is probably one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. So Painful, the narrator wants to go back in time and tell himself to not even pursue the relationship.
This was the perfect song for "13 Reasons Why"
Virgil Caine is the name
And I served on the Danville train
'Til Stoneman's cavalry came
And tore up the tracks again
In the winter of '65, we were hungry, just barely alive
By May the tenth, Richmond had fell
It's a time I remember, oh so well
The night they drove old Dixie down
And the bells were ringing
The night they drove old Dixie down
And the people were singing
They went, "Na, la-la-la, na-na
La-la, na-na, la-la-la-la-la"
Back with my wife in Tennessee
When one day she called to me
"Virgil, quick, come see
There goes Robert E. Lee"
Now I don't mind choppin' wood
And I don't care if the money's no good
You take what you need and you leave the rest
But they should never have taken the very best
The night they drove old Dixie down
And the bells were ringing
The night they drove old Dixie down
And all the people were singing
They went, "Na, la-la-la, na-na
La-la, na-na, la-la-la-la-la"
Like my father before me
I will work the land
And like my brother above me
Who took a rebel stand
He was just eighteen, proud and brave
But a Yankee laid him in his grave
I swear by the mud below my feet
You can't raise a Caine back up when he's in defeat
The night they drove old Dixie down
And the bells were ringing
The night they drove old Dixie down
And all the people were singing
They went, "Na, la-la-la, na-na
La-la, na-na, la-la-la-la-la"
The night they drove old Dixie down
And all the bells were ringing
The night they drove old Dixie down
And the people were singing
They went, "Na, la-la-la, na-na
La-la, na-na, la-la-la-la-la"
And I served on the Danville train
'Til Stoneman's cavalry came
And tore up the tracks again
In the winter of '65, we were hungry, just barely alive
By May the tenth, Richmond had fell
It's a time I remember, oh so well
The night they drove old Dixie down
And the bells were ringing
The night they drove old Dixie down
And the people were singing
They went, "Na, la-la-la, na-na
La-la, na-na, la-la-la-la-la"
Back with my wife in Tennessee
When one day she called to me
"Virgil, quick, come see
There goes Robert E. Lee"
Now I don't mind choppin' wood
And I don't care if the money's no good
You take what you need and you leave the rest
But they should never have taken the very best
The night they drove old Dixie down
And the bells were ringing
The night they drove old Dixie down
And all the people were singing
They went, "Na, la-la-la, na-na
La-la, na-na, la-la-la-la-la"
Like my father before me
I will work the land
And like my brother above me
Who took a rebel stand
He was just eighteen, proud and brave
But a Yankee laid him in his grave
I swear by the mud below my feet
You can't raise a Caine back up when he's in defeat
The night they drove old Dixie down
And the bells were ringing
The night they drove old Dixie down
And all the people were singing
They went, "Na, la-la-la, na-na
La-la, na-na, la-la-la-la-la"
The night they drove old Dixie down
And all the bells were ringing
The night they drove old Dixie down
And the people were singing
They went, "Na, la-la-la, na-na
La-la, na-na, la-la-la-la-la"
Lyrics submitted by H-bomb, edited by vinegar800, RobertGary1
The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down Lyrics as written by Robbie Robertson
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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The Band realized that the pain that the civil war caused and was still felt in the south at the time was perfect inspiration for a song. And they are refering to George Stoneman, but he was a Union General with the cavalry corps and not the Confederacy. His major task as a commander was to destroy railroads and supply lines. "tore up the tracks again." Great song full of emotion.
Sherman's March to the Sea started in Georgia, then went next door to S. Carolina. As z4kmorris correctly said above, the Georgia part was primarily for military reasons--Atlanta was one of the few industrial areas in the South, and it was the main rail hub in the Deep South. The South Carolina action was punitive, as S.C. was the first to secede, and the first shots were fired by S.C. My great-great grandfather fought for the Union (wounded 3 times) as he was an abolitionist, and yet this song moves me so much, it almost makes me feel sorry for Southerners. And I mean no irony in that last sentence. As my Uncle Bill, a combat infantryman in WWII said, "Rich old men start wars and send poor young men off to die in them." Pretty much the case for almost every war.
@OldFart53. Your Uncle Bill is correct. Thus, the "very best" refers to the young men, the vast majority of whom will always be easily led into war if the small cabal of wealthy elite put out propaganda that "those dirty bastard (fill in the blank...any "other" will do!) MFers are here to take our women! Take our land! Take our liberty!" Even the few who see through the ruse will feel tremendous pressure to conform, and will often be called unpatriotic if they don't support the war of the day.
It's an old song, but very much timely in 2017, too. There are some good interpretations here, but maybe I can add a bit to them.
Virgil Caine is a railroad engineer--a good job because it's more stable than farming (like his father) and it gets him exempted from conscription. He supports the Confederacy because he lives and works there and because even in the middle of a war, his life looks pretty good. He might even become a railroad conductor some day.
In late March 1865, Union Major General George Stoneman leads a cavalry division through northwestern North Carolina, southern Virginia, and Tennessee, tearing up railroad tracks at every opportunity to cut the lifeline between Virginia and the states further south. It's not in the song, but Virgil is no fool. He knows what his trains have been carrying to Richmond. Realizing that the war is almost over, he packs up his wife and they move to Tennesee Lee's surrender. By May 10th, one month and one day after the surrender, Virgil has given up all hope. Apparently he holds out in Virginia until Jefferson Davis passes through Danville after the surrender, but knowing all is lost, he and his wife move to Tennessee.
Railroads aren't running. and Virgil has to cut wood for his livelihood. His customers, some of whom are probably Union occupation troops, take the best of his wood and they don't pay well. It's not in the song, but all around he sees the economic, social, and political system of the south in ruins. One day, his wife calls to him to point out the steamboat Robert E. Lee on the Mississippi. The Lee was (and might still be) the fastest commercial vessel on the river. The boat, however, was built in Indiana. It's decor is majestic, but it has nothing to do with what Virgil's life is like now.
When Virgil says "Like my father before me, I will work the land," he is expressing his determination to get back something of what he has lost. It would have been much easier if his brother had survived the war to work with him, but as it is, Virgil is alone. "You can't raise a Caine back up when it's in defeat."
What about the chorus? On the night the war ended, bells undoubtedly rang to celebrate the return of peace. "na na na na na na na na na"? That could have been any of a number of syllables. For me, at least, "Na na na" conjures schoolyard taunting: "You can't catch me. Na na-na na na."
@slowhand1
@slowhand1 <br /> That was excellent also. Didn't see it at first.
@slowhand1 I think it means literaly there is Robert E Lee, with his troops . passing through and were scavanging. Virgil Cain was chopin wood and did not care if the Confederate money that was given after they took supplies from him was worthless by then and told the troops to take what you need but leave the rest but they took the best they had.
As I see it, the song is critical of both the Confederacy and the Union. After all, the side that shouldn't have taken "the very best" is the forces of Robert E Lee, whose Confederate dollars weren't worth the paper they were written on. The best in this case refers both to the quality of the trees - raping the landscape - as well as taking the best of people - the brother referred to in the next stanza. Bottom line for me is that this is a song that doesn't look at war from the perspective of ideology but rather from the perspective of how it tears apart the lives of individuals. Above all else, Virgil Caine is lamenting the loss of his brother, not defending the cause of the South. An individual caught up in the storm.
@CrackerCritter Exactly. My same interpretation.
Ummm. No one took over singing responsibilities. The band always had three great singers. Levon Helm, Rick Danco, and Richard Manual.
Actually, it's not Stonewall. It's Stoneman, as in George Stoneman, the Confederate General.
@lmh82 General Stoneman was a Union General thet ripped up miles of railroad tracks.
This is probably the greatest & truest song ever written about the South and the mindset of Southerners as the loss of the Civil War became inevitable. Remarkable when you consider it was written by a Canadian. But perhaps it took an outsider to see things as they really were.
Robbie Robertson said the music came from the grit of the soil, from the thickness of the air in the South. And the lyrics came from talking to Southerns & the way they clung to their belief that the South would rise again and also from the feeling he got from Levon Helm in his reminisces of the South & the past.
The song is a quite simply about the death of a dream. Of course the Civil War was about slavery above all else, but to Southerners it was about much more than that. It was about the dream of having their own country & maintaining their way of life. And as delusional as it was, in their minds it was a righteous cause. To them as righteous as the Colonies rising up against England or American fighting the Nazis.
So what the song captures perfectly in lyrics & music and in tone & context is the emotional fallout from slowly realizing the death of your dream, the shattering effect of knowing the cause you put everything into & gave up so much for must not have been righteous after all because you lost. This was God himself saying: "you're wrong & it's over." This was an unthinkable tragedy to the South, so emotionally devastating that it can be reasonably argued that they still haven't gotten over it.
The psychic impact of their dream dying was earth-shattering and hasn't allowed them yet to feel fully proud or correct the sins of racism because racism was so tied up in their dream that to part with racism would be to part with the dream.
Now that part is not in the song. However, the song is so knowing & empathetic that it allows one a deeper understanding of the emotions of Southerners. There aren't that many songs around that change the way you see people, places, or the world. This is one of them.
@mda8mm Pretty ironic that one of the best songs to capture the feelings of the South after the Civil War was written by a bunch of Canadians.
check theband.hiof.no/articles/dixie_viney.html
This song came from their 2nd cd, where Levon Helm i believe took over the singing responibilites, helm being the only american in the band, and from the southern states brought a southern feel to the band forsure.
@jonosur You me "LP" not CD.
Oops, I was trying too hard to be a wiseass and wrote Confederate instead of Union, guess I deserve the embarassment.