Not much is really known about Bertha Lee Pate other than she was Charley Patton common-law wife from 1930 until his death in 1934 and that their relationship was quite quarrelsome. For instance, they were put in the same jail one evening after an argument roused them to both go on a bender in Belzoni, Mississippi.
They did manage to record some songs together though including this one recorded a few months before Charlie died of a heart ailment. Bertha Lee's name is not mentioned on his death certificate.
Bertha died in Chicago less than a month before her 73rd birthday in 1975.
What are you listening to tonight?
