Songfacts®:

• There have been several songs called "Shotgun Blues," but the first appears to have been written and performed by the blues harmonica player Sonny Boy Williamson.
  
  A recording was made at Chicago on April 4, 1941, with Big Bill Broonzy on guitar. This was released on Bluebird Records, and appears to be the first ever recording of the song, on record at least. >>

  Suggestion credit:
  Alexander Baron - London, England
• Sonny Boy Williamson has a series of misadventures in this song, where he sends his baby a 20-dollar-bill (a lot of money in 1941) trying to convince her to come back to him. If that doesn't work, he has a Plan B - his shotgun.
• The song is a great example of Sonny Boy Williamson's talents on the harmonica. He's widely recognized as the first blues player to use it as a lead instrument.
• This Sonny Boy Williamson isn't the same guy who in the 1950s and 1960s rose to fame with songs like "Eyesight to the Blind" and "Help Me." The "Shotgun Blues" Sonny Boy (born John Lee Williamson) made some recordings in the late 1930s and early 1940s that earned him some renown in the world of Chicago blues. A bluesman named Rice Miller was asked to impersonate Williamson on a radio show in Arkansas, and when it went off without a hitch, he just kept using the name, which he had all to himself when the "Shotgun Blues" Sonny Boy was killed in 1948. The former Rice Miller did very well for himself and became the most famous Sonny Boy Williamson. He's sometimes referred to as Sonny Boy Williamson II to distinguish him from the other.