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[JNNY SOUTH..—The same een farmers i Goose river the way tor was driving were found at place, but ar the Lonehome, Fred, i in the snow mas day, and lis coming, 'tornoon in wood atFur-• he rolled off his home noming. hing for himIN FULTON JAIL.WIItT THE MOOMBIJIEKS 8AV OP THEMSFXTES.A Primitive bat Interesting■Ustarr.“I was to give this document into your hands,” said the pleasai.t-faceii lady messenger, handing a square-folded sheet of foolscap paper closely writton. It was dated“From the City Jail,” and proved to be the ___________________________________joint production of those two brother moun- j the whole farm at one sight. Vie did not taineers, accused of killing the revenue offi- | our grain. Welast winter, of whom a good dealoff, and he took the old pistol with him, you b itter believe, as a life guard. Mother said he slept sound as a log when they camped out, and let the pistol do all the watching for them.When we went out hunting at night, it was mostly a good many of us together, and often we made a big haul of possums and coons, with a big wild cat thrown into the bargain now and then. We made breeches out of our deer hides, and hats and caps out of our fur skins, and our foot-wear was often homemade too. We tanned our own leather and made our own shoes and moccasins. Sometimes we made then* out of raw ground hog, raccoon, fox or wild cat skins. If we felt like we wanted stockings, we turned the fur inside.The farm we cleared was a North mountain side, and we built in the valley below. We could stand in the door and look andwritten in the little sketch—“An Hour City Jail”—published last week in the Sunny South. On hearing the men’s quaint account of some of the ways of living of these dwellers on the heights, we had said to the friend accompanying us that such details would be new and curious to most people and would no doubt interest some read-• paper. The result of this remark ‘document” handed us—a fragmentary sketch of mountain life, composed (so a note informed os) by both brothers, but written by Tom Jones, the “scholar” of the two; though both are men of more than or-_________f dinary native intelligence, and, as we learngaWU.Arte from their county Legislative member, men ^ ■ of great influence in the community wherethey live. They are fair specimens of the type they represent; the shrewd, hardv mountaineer, with sinewy frame and keen, rude intellect, and sturdy independence; an eye that indicates sensibility and a firm set mouth and chin that tell of stubborn insist-ance on what they hold as their rights.The trouble with these men is that they have lived so entirely out of the current of law and society—like the Montenegrins and the Alpine Swiss—have lived isolated among the crags and skies and forests and the free wild creatures of the woods, till they have come to feel as though they were a law to themselves—a kind of Republic on their account. They can not realize that they are inside the cordon of govermental law until they feel it tighten around their privileges; then they growl and bite as one of their own wolves would do should a collar be clamped around his neck. To this circumstance of location and this untamed feeling of individual rights handed down from father to son, is due in part the contempt of the “new-fangled law” and the resistance to its armed enforcers that so annoy the government. A touch of this characteristic is seen in the latter part of this little sketch, which we print as it was written, even to the quaint heading,“THE CAOED WILDS.”When you came to s *e us this week, ylt; said you would like to hear about our mou tain ways, and to have us write it out: that it would be new to the people that read your paper. Well, it seems like there isn’t much to tell, but I will begin. When we came to the mountains, in the winter of 1847 and ’48, we moved into Cherokee county. At that time the county was very thinly settled: the whole country was wild and full of game. We settled on the head waters of Turtletown Creek, on what was known as Pack Mountain. The houses the people lived in were built mostly of rough, unhewn, r und logs; to save labor these were put up with very —made very large cracks K ♦, °£?D and put them up.lth,tI,c j1'4* SK,e 1,1 i he roof was made of clapboards wat tled on with poles. The common floor was just the natural earth, but we spl t puncheons and made us a floor which served very well. The chimneys were sticks and clay usually, but a great many folks had no chi uneys at all. Some of the hous~! ere built with five corners, and the fifth I 111 Drner was for a fireplace. tlthtag l y eat as a KJL6 garden*1'vegetables »'Cried women | ’canoe. Why ) M e very of,en had to kiln dry our cor ddonly, even »»d the nulling was unhandy, but wehart bridal robes i j mortars and pestles, and we beat our grain le American ‘.ito meal We raised flax and some sheen-of our great j amI out of the flax and the wool we mm?'»'n put upon own clothes. Onr dressing ’was very conditions in | simple. \\ e wore only two arment*--oses ? Is she breeches that had one seam to the 1 lt;»•»■ mid instances, iii woollen hunting shirts. The women’s rimMM were loos* with draw-strings in thJwST wa?dUnelwitlt;llid ^ the PlowingI ^ s-£ I £’he Milledge-: “The city of lits, more lite-writers, than leading cities as tffar-jiato* lanc *, it is ac-th ult., says: ,nd venerable yients forever, Arte■magogue, and I never pollute •Ids her court gned so long, r inkle and the ue to hold in isive oilt;i struc-trembled with and old Troup noble Jenkins, ising sun!n Maine.-line, had occa-, sinking it be-p. After pro-mtered a rock-.iameter, lying •w the surface. ; separating in he cut off with inch thus veil, all stoned ibout the same this in closure »nt cool water* ly since, never or freezing in and by whom long has the en swimming ? *1 an estimate reds of years, f credulity to L' years for its1 Bolls.—A■ following ivite the atteu-It S.'”*-Ilioption inotheT-in-Iaw, havAig been rford Stuyve-«nt, of Bruok-has also died ntly happen,xl !• thin twelve •me a mother, I these are very | ordinAi enterfc fat all lmurs. lealtbv fasli-girl of the Ithv as her York fash-frolics and amusements up there among the rocks and wolve , and I’m going to tell you about these — and about our religion, and our schooling and our courting, in my next—if you want any more of this simple kind of story of our mountain life as you were pleased to say you would like to read about. Only our means are limited, and if you would please to send us a little paper and a better pen, we will do better in our next. We hav’nt yet begun to tell you aliout the Revenues that come among us like wolves on the sheep and broke up our way of living like free people and distilling a little whisky for our own use and to sell. You will say this is the law; it was not the law in the days when we were a free people; and it can’t be the law to carry out things as some of the officers do—let out counterfeiters andtheiving tramps from prison and give them their freedom and pay beside if they will pilot the soldiers to the places where we are said to have onr little stills; anl here they swoop down on us as if we was wild hogs or some other kind of brute game, and they curse us, and catch us and drag us off to jail where we lie months and months while our wives and children are starving in the mountains. I don’t say thus is so with all the officers and soldiers; but it is with some; and its hard if its fair; but I don’t believe its fair.Meaning no offense, and hoping this will displeasure nobody and that if you want more of onr poor writing you will send little paper and a pen that won’t sputter.We sign ourselves your friends.Tom Ayers Jones.Plenty of paper and a pen that won’t sputter shall certainly find its way to the cell of the “Caged Wilds” ami we think we can speak for our readers that they would like to hear how meetings, frolics and courting* managed in the mountains; but no more about “them Revenues” if you please friends. That Ls dangerous ground; and though we worship liberty, we hold that men may have too much of it for there own or the public good. In the initter of distilleries for in stance, instead of regretting that these cannol be carried on without a costly license, vvlt; would be glad if there was a law abolishing t lem utterly. An l you friends, we trust that when you are freed from your cage turn to your mountain homes, it will minds so enlarged by change and by influx of new ideas and so refined by sorrow flection that you will make use of v fluence, of your splendid energy and manly vigor to induce your people to give up this business of distilling. We hope you will work at this mission with so much of the vim which is in you, that not even a revenue spyglass shall l« able to discern the smoke of “Old Johns” pipe; and in place of it, we shall t .e peacefully smoking chimneys .of multiplied school /Houses and happy homes, with more pler*fcif«r gardens farms and pat-‘lies. People who can raise ten pound cabbages, one hiding a still pi™, am.n . thT” the ground and turning0the staff of Ufetata I'dior that blunts the moral faCult ., ™“tb ™nl and retards culture amiHundred leloy'■a I hernraid, afterata^K” “ x ass ak;nd run'amUhat very I cinenot letting us know that was 52 khiTof I and' game you wanted.” *,ml of a,m , The trouble with us was {’*it our pa- home after we had killed it Tr 5a.me Ul.■a SsSS?—?'—‘SBKKines and have to^nmntan'1 *lle-v lt;uM I «ockL ?? j 1 IF5= 351 ‘'K-v sir sef■s of the | outer the rocks with the heels of onrtten,?™ rvSoi-TH 'as,''s- wolves a veiling after us °Uk?a:eV'“k I madftlK£tSn,ksrarta/hT;i 1 «A .letbodist theeytelescu as iiuslit is tri allotte* UfWIl tl than t the ere;»r exist-»re yen-periodi-n withThev’d often tuck Srtales°,mV JT1 ii1ke‘ hind us, just barkiug at the^hvL ;i 0t closest. And where were?-!!, at cmnetols; Well, guns were i£nnS and pis‘ much in the S .IT Z.’ Jhea.' a»d toomucn in tne waj- when we -C..V game to bring it home- 1,1,’? af?T our didn’t know am-thimr ahoio^r one any of the ^“^w‘y™er ^’*“1 ^ j brought there bv mv father w wasr« and man of our settleiiVenf ;. He Y'as the big . ™M1 n will j by his having a hewn loir hf2iU- ,mi®5t ,tno'v ^apy rheon floor it. WeU^he f P|,ni'.ftb: »“5sy u M l/™'! Mrs. excellei his wife sidered but Mr catching pronoun t ures ar Gregery
Newspaper Details
Atlanta Sunny South
Atlanta, Georgia, US
Sat, Feb 07, 1880
Page 4
Full Page
Clipped by
Andrew W.
USA 03 Mar 2025
Other Publications Near Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta Weekly Intelligencer and Cherokee Advocate
Atlanta Presbyterian of the South
Atlanta University Center Light
Atlanta Crogman Cycle
Atlanta Daily Constitution
