There is a decidedly darker mood in the United States than ever in our lifetimes, it seems. In just one example poll recently, one in five Americans agreed that violence is necessary to get the country back on track. With that in mind, it seems like a good time to remember what happened the last time the country acted on this, when we fought the Civil War. Between 1861 and 1865, at least 1,030,000 people were killed, including about 620,000 soldier deaths—two-thirds by disease—and 50,000 civilians. No major battles were fought in the North Carolina mountains, although there was one particularly dark Appalachian chapter of the bloody nationwide saga, the Shelton Laurel Massacre, which took place in Madison County NC.

Here, we revisit the first of a two-part series that originally published in 2021. The original article, with much more back story, is on our page here, and you can find these and 150 other episodes of Southern Songs and Stories on your podcast app of choice.

Songs heard in this episode:

“Bonaparte’s Retreat” by Fiddlin’ Arthur Smith & His Dixieliners

“Beautiful Dreamer” by Hesperus from A Civil War Scrapbook

“8th of January/Cumberland Gap/8th Day of January” by Sheila Kay Adams, from All The Other Fine Things

Southern Songs and Stories is a part of the podcast lineup of both public radio WNCW and Osiris Media, with all of the Osiris shows available here . You can also hear new episodes of this podcast on Bluegrass Planet Radio here. Thanks to Carol Rifkin for pointing me to much of the music here, to Sean Rubin for converting tapes of the show Over Home to digital format, and to Corrie Askew for producing the radio adaptations of this series on public radio WNCW, where we worked with Joshua Meng, who wrote and performed our theme songs.

Artist stereotypes do not apply

How many times have parents cringed when their children fell in love with a musician? Let's be honest, the world has looked askance at artists of all stripes (with notable exceptions) for most of our history. Musicians tend to be thought of as people who may be great at their art but who are nonetheless pretty bad at life skills like paying bills, getting to work on time, and sticking with the missus.

Aaron turns all those stereotypes on their head; he is not only a fantastic songwriter and musician, but he also runs his own construction business and is a devoted family man living a stone's throw from where he grew up in the western NC mountains. He is as meticulous and intense about his guitar and ballads as he is about his green built homes and raising his two girls.

As you'll see in our pilot episode, Aaron does both life and art exceptionally well. The folks around him are a big part of that.