Music & Lyrics by Drew Brody
My name was Mildred Jeter for 17 years of life
Till Richard Perry Loving asked me to be his bride
We drove 80 miles to the capitol
I didn’t ask why
But I found out in time
Someone in Caroline County didn’t like my kind
I awoke to the local sheriff’s flashlight in my eyes
He said “Richard who’s this woman here?”
I said, “I’m his wife”
He said “you know that that’s a crime”
I said:
We’re just Loving in Virginia
Never meant to do nobody harm
We’re just trying to make a life like everyone else
We’re just happy, that is all
And I will never understand how the world got so mad
We were just loving, we were just loving
Loving in Virginia
The judge said: “Almighty God made people black and white
And he separated them for a reason with an ocean they’re divided
And who are we to overturn his plan? We’re just men
So you gotta to go to prison “
“On one condition,” he said, “I will let you go
If you pack your bags today, leave Virginia, leave your home”
So we said goodbye to Caroline County and everything we’d known
And we set off on our own
But don’t you know
We were just Loving in Virginia
I never set out to break now law
We were just trying to make a life like everyone else
We were just happy that is all
And I will never understand how the world got so mad
We’re just loving, we’re just loving
Loving in Virginia
We moved to the slums of Washington and I tell you times was bad
We raised three kids: 3 beautiful kids, but I missed my Virginia land
We bounced back and forth from court to court
Spent everything we had
10 years later we were vindicated by the highest court in the land
They said “you’ve been denied a fundamental civil right of man”
I said “Richard, this is why were put here, this was all God’s plan”
And so we packed our bags
And once again
We were Loving in Virginia
Never set out to change now law
We were just trying to make a life like everyone else
We were just happy that is all
And I will never understand how the world got so mad
We’re just loving, we’re just loving
Loving in Virginia
Richard Perry Loving died in 1975
In a car crash that took his life and left me blind in one eye
To the man I fought so hard to keep I had to say goodbye
In the hills of Caroline County I still make my home
And every day I think of the man whose name described his soul
And from my good eye I look out on a world that’s still has room to grow
Still a ways to go
But don’t you know-
We were just Loving in Virginia…