The Godwinns The Godwinns was the most well known gimmick of the professional wrestling tag team composed of Dennis Knight ( Phineas I . Godwinn ) and Mark Canterbury ( Henry O . Godwinn ) that they used in the WWF . The team has used other gimmicks before they joined the WWF and had a gimmick change in the WWF shortly before disbanding . Their WWF gimmick was that of two cousins who were hog farmers from Arkansas . Their names were a rather unsubtle joke as a reference to this ; Phineas ' initials spelled PIG while Henry ' s spelled HOG . History . The two men who would later be known as the Godwinns first started teaming in the United States Wrestling Association under the names Tex Sallinger ( Phineas ) and Master Blaster ( Henry ) in 1991 . Master Blaster was masked while Sallinger was not . Due to their stature and ring outfits , some mistakenly believed that Sallinger and Blaster were a well traveled team known as " The Texas Hangmen " under a different gimmick as the Hangmen had recently left the USWA . The team feuded mainly with Jeff Jarrett and Robert Fuller as a part of the “ Texas / Tennessee ” storyline . After achieving little notoriety in the USWA , the two men were signed by World Championship Wrestling in 1992 . Tex and Shanghai . The duo was renamed " Tex Slazinger " and " Shanghai Pierce " who remained masked and made their debut in November 1992 . Their debut was without much fanfare as they were at best perceived as a mid - card team used to help establish higher level teams . They did have a “ mini - feud ” of sorts with Kent & Keith Cole , the Cole Twins ( who ’ s biggest claim to fame was that they were identical twins ) . Tex and Shanghai would mainly appear on the WCW “ B ” shows such as " WorldWide " and " WCW Saturday Night " . Tex Slazinger somehow got a cult following among the fans of the “ Saturday Night ” tapings who ’ d chant for him when he was in the ring . During one Saturday Night show , color commentator Jesse Ventura nicknamed them " the Texicans " although the name never became official . Tex and Shanghai appeared at very few WCW pay - per - view ( PPV ) s losing every time they were in the spotlight except for one occasion : Battlebowl in 1993 . Tex and Shanghai found themselves on opposite sides in a “ Lethal Lottery ” tag - team match , which meant that one of them would actually get a PPV victory . Rick Rude and Shanghai Pierce won the match but Shanghai was quickly eliminated in the ensuing battle royal . In their time in WCW , they help put over future tag - team champions such as 2 Cold Scorpio and Marcus Alexander Bagwell and Cactus Jack and Maxx Payne . In 1994 , Shanghai Pierce was unmasked during a bout with Johnny B . Badd and from that day forward appeared unmasked . Sometime after the summer of 1994 , Tex and Shanghai left WCW ; Shanghai was signed by the WWF while Tex worked a stint in the independent circuit that included a return to his old stomping grounds of the USWA . The Godwinns . Canterbury had joined the WWF in late 1994 and been repackaged with a “ Hog Farmer ” gimmick and renamed “ Henry O . Godwinn ” . Canterbury first worked as a heel with the Million Dollar Corporation under Ted DiBiase ’ s management and then later as a face after being kicked out of the stable . In the early parts of 1996 , Dennis Knight was signed with the WWF and became " Phineas I . Godwinn ” , Henry ’ s cousin . The team was managed by Hillbilly Jim and actually made their debut shortly before the tournament began to crown new tag team champions after Billy Gunn suffered a neck injury . The Godwinns made it all the way to the finals at WrestleMania XII where they lost to the Bodydonnas . The Godwinns feuded with the Bodydonnas for the next couple of months , not just over the tag team titles but because Phineas had become infatuated with the Bodydonna ’ s manager Sunny , something which initially worked against the Godwinns . The Godwinns finally got their revenge on the Bodydonnas by winning the tag team titles from them in May 1996 . Sunny also joined with them at this point , although she specifically joined to use Phineas and remain near the tag team gold . At , the Godwinns lost the titles to the Smokin ' Gunns , and Sunny moved on as she paired up with Billy Gunn and kept close to the tag team titles . The Godwinns would feud with the Gunns over the summer but would not regain the titles . For the rest of 1996 , the Godwinns would remain a solid mid - card team . During a match in April , Henry Godwinn suffered a cracked C7 vertebra when the Legion of Doom botched a Doomsday Device . Henry was told to take at least 15 weeks off to fully recover from the injury but returned in less than 8 weeks . Shortly after Henry returned to active duty , the team would turn heel , ditching their fun loving pig farmer gimmick for something more dark and sinister . They took Uncle Cletus as their manager and began attacking their opponents with their slop buckets . The turn and subsequent feud with the Headbangers would pay off as the Godwinns won tag gold once more on October 5 , 1997 at Badd Blood . Unfortunately , their joy was short - lived as they would lose the titles to the Legion of Doom only 2 days later in a retirement match thanks to a botched interference by Uncle Cletus . Following their loss , the Godwinns took out their frustration on Uncle Cletus by busting his head wide open , and he was never seen again in the WWF after that . Southern Justice . After the feud with the Legion of Doom ended , the team began to flounder again with no real direction . Direction came during the summer of 1998 . The two teamed up with Jeff Jarrett and adopted a “ Southern Hired Gun ” type of gimmick that saw them use their real names of Mark Canterbury and Dennis Knight for the first time . The team was named “ Southern Justice ” and they backed up Jeff Jarrett in a feud with D - Generation X . They even clashed with D - X at the PPV where they lost to Billy Gunn , Road Dogg , and X - Pac . Shortly after the PPV , Canterbury herniated his C7 vertebrae and pinched a spinal nerve ; this necessitated spinal fusion surgery , a result of Canterbury returning to the ring before he should have . After the neck injury and spinal fusion , Canterbury left the WWF and retired from pro - wrestling . Dennis Knight remained with the company for a couple of years as a member of The Undertaker ' s Ministry of Darkness . He was repackaged as ” Mideon ” and later , after the Ministry disbanded , he wrestled as ” Naked Mideon ” , a gimmick which saw him wrestle in a loincloth . Deep South Wrestling . In September 2006 , Canterbury wrestled several tryout matches with World Wrestling Entertainment . On September 15 , 2006 , WWE announced that he had been signed to a contract . He debuted in Deep South Wrestling on 11 / 30 as a tag partner for Ray Gordy . Gordy was known as Cousin Ray as the team used the ” Pigfarmer ” gimmick ; Gordy would later be moved to the SmackDown brand under the ring name " Jesse " .