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Transcripts: Southern Appalachian English
Eugene Sutton
(Cataloochee Creek, Haywood County, North Carolina) was age 43 when interviewed. He had a third- or fourth-grade education and was a farmer.
Name Eugene Sutton, age forty-three, born and raised in Cataloochee in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park. About thirty years ago, at that time we made a lot of liquor in this country. Very near everybody made it. An uncle of mine and a cousin [were] making liquor in above my home, and I was about thirteen, fourteen years old, thirteen, I guess, and got word that the revenuers [were] coming. And so thisson, he was scared, but decided to run the liquor anyway, and they gave me a rifle, told me to go up on the mountain and watch for the officers. If the officers come, I was to fire three shots and they could run off. I made them give me a quart of liquor. Naturally we all drank then, you know. Everybody'd drink, big, little, young, and old, and I had the quart of liquor and drank too much, got to feeling good. A bunch of pheasants came up the ridge to me along in the evening, I killed three, fired three shots, which was the signal for them to tear out the still and leave, and my uncle and cousin came very near burning themselves up to get this still out, get it away. And then I wanted to show my pheasants that I had killed, so I had to go down to the still, and I was out of liquor too. I had drank the quart and spilled a part of it and had to go down get me some more liquor. I went down and wanted, wanted to know what was wrong, said "Which way are they coming?" I said "who?" "Why, the revenue officers." I said, "No revenue officers [are] a-comin' that I know anything about." "But you fired three shots." "Oh," I said, "I was killing pheasants. I say three shots." I says, "Look a here what a pretty bunch of birds I killed." And then this uncle of mine was about to kill me. He got up a big brush, whipped me all the way down the hollow in home.
Uncle George Palmer, better known as Turkey George in this country a-way back when he was a boy, did a lot of hunting, and I think his record showed that he had killed a hundred and one bear, all in the Great Smoky Mountain Park, National Park prior to his death a few years ago. And he also hunted for other game, turkey, bear, squirrel, coon, possum, and what have you. And the way he got his name, as I understand it, and this Turkey George, that he couldn't kill the turkey with his gun. He'd missed so many that he decided to build a pen and baited this pen with corn and went up one morning and had why, I don't know how many, but as the story goes, it must have been a half a dozen of the turkeys in the pen, and Uncle George undertook catching them and bringing them home. When he got ahold of the birds, two or three of them at once caught onto him, onto their legs, and they just about whipped him to death, and he had to come in and get help. He dropped the pen back down on the turkey. He still kept a part of them in the pen and come home and got help to go back and carry in the turkeys. And I suppose this is true, because very near everybody in the whole country has told the same story, and Uncle George never did deny it.
My grandfather came to the Cataloochee when he was a young man, married and settled here and raised a family of fourteen children. At his death he was ninety-four year, two months and seven days old, fourteen children, seventy-six grandchildren, a hundred and eighty-six great grandchildren, fourteen great great grandchildren, and two great great great grandchildren, and only one of his grandsons made a preacher, the Reverend B. B. Caldwell, at the present time of Greenville, South Carolina. Naturally Grandfather was kindly proud of him, that he made a preacher, so he was holding a meeting, a revival, in a small church on the, over on the mountain. Grandfather was standing up in the pulpit with him, couldn't hear very well. He was about ninety years old then, and Cousin Brown preaching away, Grandfather a-talkin' to the congregation back in the house. Brown would preach, Grandpa would say, "now pay attention to him there, notice him, you'd better listen at him. He's a-tellin' you the truth, every word of it." Cousin Brown says, "My good people, I'm a-goin' to tell you, if you don't quit this way of living, quit living in sin all the days of your life, riding in these old automobiles, drinking liquor, playing cards, going to dances, and things like that, every one of you is going to hell." Grandfather spoke up and said, "Yes, and from there to the penitentiary," said, "They sent four or five of them the other day up there," said, "I was there and heared them send them," and that's all.