Like many other moonshiners from western North Carolina, eastern Tennessee, and Kentucky, Owens joined the Confederate Army during the Civil War, fighting in the Battle of Bull Run and later serving in the 56th North Carolina Regiment. During the War, he served time in Union stockades. When he returned home to Cherry Mountain, he vowed never to pay the federal excise tax on distilled spirits which President Lincoln had reintroduced in 1862 to help fund the Union's war efforts.