The age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1897-1902, 1897-11-28

Gainesville, Ca, Nov. 27.-"I raise the
grain and l make the stuff. It's all mine.
Who's got any right to tax my whisky.
The burned gov ment amt got nothin
to do with 1t. This tax is no more'n
stealing Why don't they tax me- fer
rais,n' hogs and maxim bacon out'n en-"
The speaker was a tall man, with deep
set but bright and unfinching eyes,
dirty yellowish complexion, coarse sandy
hair, and a struggling beard of the same
color. He was sitting in front Of a blaz-
ing log fire in a typical mountain cabin
built of logs and covered with clapboards,
which nestles in niche on the side of
Raccoon mountain, a spur Of. the Blue
Ridge, just on the line between Fannin
and Gilmer~counties.
Jim Sparks IS farmer, a politician,
and a moonshiner. king JIM is his
title among the mountain boys, and a
bigger hearted and more generous fellow
never lived. Jim is rough, uneducated
lid sometimes boi ste Gus but is known
Throughout the moonehine district as true
grit and generous to his friends. The
revenue men are his only enemiss and
they do not annoy him much. This sec
ton of Georgia is not healthy place
for the deputy marshals. They go
through here occasionally, but in doing
so make use eff some discretionL
Just two days before Sparks made use
of the above expression, Col. Bill Findley
and myself started out from the little
city OF Gainesville to make a tour
through the moonshina district of Gecr-
gia. Col Findlsy is a lawy D. who was
born up here in the mountains and has
spent all his life among these rough
but generous ara kind-hearte1 people.
When in trouble he is the man to whom
fh y always appeal and hundreds of them
have been saved froim a term in Jail by
his eloquenee and shrewdness. They do
not consider it a crime 10 make their
corn into whisky Col Findley has the
absolute and complete confidence of these
people. All the moonshiners know him
and there is not an Illicit distillery in
North Georgia into which he cannot go
and receive a royal welcome.
To be with him was all that was need
ed to make me likewise welcome Though
this is not healthy locality for strang-
er without native escort
After two days journey on horseback
through a picturesque noun ainouS coun-
try ws arrived in the heart of the moon
sinners district and ait King Jim'S'' we
We're welcomed with as much hospitality
as 1t was possible for him to show His
home is a cabin of legs built in niche
of the mounta'n mar The base, and be-
side a clear but small mountain stream.
Sparr ), his W f. aid five children, the
oldest, of whom was a girl of about twen-
ty, lived in this cabin of two rooms.
There was but one bed in the house The
children slept on pallets on the floor. The
entire furniture of the house consisted
of this bed table, half dozen split
bottom chairs, a small looklng glass and
some cooking utensils. The cooking was
done in the great opsn fireplace, which
serves as a stove, a CRATE and a lamp.
There is no other light about the house
at nights. About the room on nails
driven in the logs and hanging from the
joistS overhead were all the posse ssionS
of the moonshiner's family consisting of
homespun articles of dress, some calico
purchased from a settlement Store, seeds,
medicinal herbs, strings of red peppers,
balsam apples and various other articles.
After hearty supper of corn brsad,
bacon and baked opossum with some
swtet potatoes, Sparks drew up to the
great fireplace and we opened a discus
SIGN about the life of the mountaineers.
1t was then that he gave expression to
his vDews concerning the unjustness of
the Internal revenue laws.
I'VE don't belisve we airs doing wrong
when we make our little crop of corn into
whisky he continued lighting a home
made root pipe. I'VE can't we'll get our
corn to market, and when we do, it don't
bring nothin'. But when we still it and
get a good run of whisky we manage to
get that whar we can sell 1t and get a
good many more times monsn the corn
would eur brung. We look on that as no
harm and we are not. go,n' to allow these
revenue men to come UP here and break
up our stills and carry us down to Jail for
dom what's not wrong"
Sparks has no stil of his own at or
near his house, but there are stills all
around in the mountains, and at this sea-
son of the year all of them are making
big runs. Some of the stills are owned
by che man, and others by half dozsn;
but all the mountaineers are banded to-
gether for mutual protection, and during
the season when runs are being made the
mountains and approaches TO the stills,
for miles around, are guarded, and the
arrival of a stranger in the section Is at
once, within a few hours, known for
twenty miles around.
Should band of revenue officers be
discovered, horns are blown from the
mountain tops, the fires are smothered
in the stills and all traces that would
Head to their discovery are covered up.
If the still happens to be in a cave,
the opening is closed up; but should 1t
happen to be in log hut in some out-of-
the-way ravine, and the blockadtrs have
reason to believe that they cannot pro-
tect 1t, they often pun the still proper
out of the clay furnace surrounding IL
and hide II IN the WOODS. Tor III is a gov
eminent law that when a still is discov-
cred 1t must be destroyed.
The average moonshiner would much
prefer to be captured himself, especially
if it be in the winter Tins, than to have
his still captured and destroyed. II is
somewhat of a picnic for moonshiner
with a small family to be carried down
to Atlanta and imprisoned for thirty or
sixty days. There he is well fed and
his quarters, though small are more COM
Portable than the average one has at his
mountain home. The family of a moon
sinner who happens to get caught and
sent to Jail. is always locked after by
the other mountainesrs in the neighbor-
hood, whether they happen to make Wild
cat whisky or not. Indeed, these people
are the least selfish on the face of the
globe If one family has but peck of
meal in the world, and sses no way to get
another when that is gone. a needy
neighbor can get the half of that by the
0sking.
After an hours talk with Jim around
the big fire suggested that I should like
to go into moonshine still if there hap
pened to > 2 one near.