Just across
the Kentucky line
in Tennessee, live a peculiar people. They are known as the
Malungeons. They are splendid specimens of the human race , copper
colored with high cheek bones, straight noses, black hair, rather
coarse and straight, eyes invariably black, and above the ordinary
mountaineer in intelligence. Their
peculiar color and their customs have caused them a great deal of
trouble. They number between 200 and 400. The live on Black Water
Creek, in Hancock County, and they have lived in this section for over
100 years. The records of Hancock county show that the ancestors of
this strange people came to Powell’s Valley as early 1789 when they
took up lands on Black Water.
Tradition
says that they held aloof from white settlers and spoke in strange
language, which none of the people understood. Some of them spoke
broken English, and by this means communicated with the white merchants
in the extent of buying arms and ammunition and other supplies which
they could not raise in their mountain homes. They intermarried until
their racial characteristic were so thoroughly established in their
progeny that the frequent marrying of strangers by members of the
colony during recent years has had no perceptible effect on their
colony, hair and general resemblance to their ancestors, who lived half
a century ago.
Before
the war the Malungeons had a hard time in obtaining the right to vote
and to send their children to the primitive public schools of that day.
The white citizens declared they were negros, and the matter finally
caused so much bickering and strife between the Malungeons and the
whites that it was carried into the courts. In the trials which
followed it was developed that the ancestors of these people had
emigrated to America about 150 years ago from the interior of Portugal;
that they had preserved their native habits and customs while
sojourning in South Carolina and that when they emigrated to Tennessee
they were practically the same people which left Portugal fifty years
before. They declared on the witness stand that there was not a drop of
negro blood in their veins and after long and tedious litigation they
were finally allowed the right of suffrage and were permitted to send
their children to the public schools, and the wrangling of years was
over.
When
the war broke out between the States in 1861 they espoused the cause of
the Union. They fought in usual mountain fashion–bushwhacking–and many
a Confederated soldier was sent to his long home by warring bullets of
these Portuguese Americans. Whenever the Confederates captured any of
them they were greatly dreaded by the soldiers, and whenever a column
was marching to the Malungeon territory extra precaution was taken
against bushwhackers.
After
the war closed and the Malungeons returned to their old pursuits they
found the government was interfering with one of their oldest
industries–whiskey making. They had been distillers back in South
Carolina and some of the early stills in Tennessee were brought by
their ancestors over the mountain from the first named state. When they
found a tax of $2 a gallon on the product of their mills they openly
defied the government which had levied it. They did not make whisky
openly, it is true but they sold it in the open market after they had
made it in their ‘moonshine’ stills. They became very much incensed
against revenue officials who came into their country, and not a few of
the officers were killed with their deadly Winchesters. Of late years
the revenue men have been so persistent to their work of hunting the
moonshiner down that the Malungeons have sold but little whisky openly.
They still continue to make moonshine, however in large quantities, but
they have adopted the methods of other illicit distillers in Kentucky
and Tennessee, and are rarely caught now.
Notwithstanding
railroads have penetrated Eastern Kentucky and Eastern Tennessee, the
Malungeons never go far from home. It is a rare thing to see them on
this side of the state line, although a few of them go to the village
of Cumberland Gap, Tennessee, one in a great while to lay in supplies.
Occasionally one or two Malungeons are seen in Tazewell, Tennessee but
it is seldom indeed that a member of this unique community is seen in
Knoxville or Middlesboro.
Paradoxical
as it may seem these people who have shed much blood and other wise
violated the laws of their country, are deeply religious. In this
respect they very much resemble the Southern Negroes. During their
meetings they will sing and shout and seem to be beside themselves with
religious fervor. One of the patriarchs of the Malungeons was “uncle”
Vard Collins, who was a devout Christian. One night in June, may years
ago Dr. Frederick A. Ross (*See Below), a noted Presbyterian minister
of eastern Tennessee, was traveling through the Black Water country. He
accidentally came upon the “Uncle Vard’s” house and after he had fed
his horse and the guest had eaten supper the old man asked him his
business. He told him he was a preacher. The old man said he would like
to hear him preach. “Where is your congregation” asked the minister.
“I’ll get one in a few minutes,” replied “Uncle Vard.” He took a long
dinner horn from its rack over the door and going out doors blew
several shrill blasts. Within an hour a congregation of fifty people
had assembled in answer to the horn and Dr. Rose said afterward that he
never preached to an audience which showed greater appreciation and
deeper religious feeling than did the little band of copper colored
mountaineers on Black Water. “Uncle Vard” lived to be 101 years old.
Politically
the Malungeons were Whigs before the war, and since the rebellion they
have been Republicans. They are very clannish and in Republican
primaries they all support the same man, while at regular elections
they vote the republican ticket straight. Their customs have not
changed during the last 200 years.
They
still live in the log cabin and while many of the younger men have the
improved Winchesters and Martins the older citizens continue to use the
long home made squirrel rifles which invariably hang on a rack above
the old fashioned fire place. They are hospital to a degree and no
stranger, unless they think he is a revenue man is ever turned away
from their cabins. Their peach brandy is pronounced the best in the
mountains and it is freely offered to the wayfarer under their roofs,
tempered with wild mountain honey. The original settlers were the
Collins, Gibson and Mullins and it is difficult to find a Malungeon
today who is not called by one of those names.
They
are practically the same people who lived here for years before a
railroad was built and while the march of progress has encircled the
Black Water Valley the Malungeons has not profited by the civilization
around them, but remain the same peculiar people— St. Louis
Globe-Democrat
July
25, 1842
Republican Compiler -- Gettysburg
"In Tennessee the business is making rapid strides. At the last
session of the Legislature of that Sate, a bounty law passed allowing a
dollar and half per pound on silk raised and reeled in the State by the
same person. Great crops were produced last season. The Rev. Frederick A. Ross of Hawkins
County made last season 300 pounds of reeled silk, which sold
promptly for five dollars a pound.
