Jimmy Driftwood wrote “Tennessee Stud.” Born James Corbett Morris in 1907, he lived in Stone County, Arkansas, and also wrote “The Battle of New Orleans.” He recorded “Tennessee Stud” on 26 November 1958, and it was first released in 1959. According to Bear Family Records’ biography, the song was inspired by a real horse that belonged to the great-grandfather of Driftwood’s wife, John Merriman. Driftwood wrote in 1966 that Merriman fell out with his sweetheart’s family and rode off into the Arkansas Territory, later returned to Tennessee, bested her family and carried the girl back to Arkansas.
The song tells a longer story with the horse at the center. Around 1825 the narrator leaves Tennessee after trouble with his sweetheart’s father and one of her brothers, and the Tennessee Stud carries him through the Arkansas mud and across the Rio Grande. He wins silver and gold racing the horse against a Spaniard’s foal and kills a gambler in a gunfight over Tennessee. Lonesome for his girl, he heads back to Arkansas, where he finds her riding a Tennessee mare. They cross the mountains and the Big Muddy together and settle in a cabin, where a baby plays on the floor and a colt plays in the yard.
Eddy Arnold was the first artist to cover it. His RCA Victor single reached number 5 on the Billboard country chart and number 48 on the Hot 100 in 1959, and was nominated for Grammy awards in both the country and folk categories. Doc Watson recorded it on Southbound (Vanguard, 1966), on the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s Will the Circle Be Unbroken (United Artists, 1972), and on his own Doc & the Boys (United Artists, 1976). The Osborne Brothers recorded it on 28 May 1970 at Bradley’s Barn in Mount Juliet, Tennessee, with Bobby Osborne singing lead, Sonny Osborne on banjo and Dale Sledd on guitar and harmony, and it appeared on their self-titled Decca album in 1971. Dobro player Mike Auldridge put an instrumental version on his 1972 album Dobro.
