Powdered. As in gunpowder. They used him for a makeshift cannon.
powdered… sorry … was a long time ago 
I knew he was a cannon… In my more studious times I tried to figure out how exactly that might work… (did I mention I was a really little kid then?)
When you think about it now, what they probably meant was they put the gunpowder up the gator’s … um… behind, and the cannonball in front, and let 'er rip.
Of course, if you sang a song like that now, you’d have not only the morality police on your case for advocating committing unnatural acts, plus glorifying violence, but you’d have the animal rights people protesting the degradation of the poor innocent alligator. Yeah, those were the days. Not like now…