Hi all:
Long time no post. I made a promise to you all that, one day, I would be able to share with you the story of the man who inspired Shack Attack. Here it is. This is pretty much a direct quote out of my book so, please, don't share it outside of the Brethren forum. If you are not familiar with Shack sauce, here is the original thread.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/showthread.php?t=136085
Shackleford Pounds
A result of the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1901–2 was the disenfranchisement of poor people, especially people of color. If a man couldn’t pay the poll tax, he couldn’t vote. However, Confederate veterans of the Civil War were exempt from the tax. Nevertheless, soon after the new state constitution was established, officials turned away Shackelford Pounds, a heroic African American veteran of the Civil War, when he attempted to register to vote in his Pittsylvania County, Virginia, voting precinct.
In 1861, Frederick Douglass commented on the many African Americans in the Confederate army who, at the time, were serving as cooks, servants, laborers and soldiers. In our times, neo-Confederates cite Douglass’s comments in an effort to insinuate that African Americans willingly fought for the principles of the Confederacy. However, it is a stretch of logic to think that slaves would risk life and limb fighting to remain enslaved.
According to an enslaved man named John Parker who fought for the Confederacy at Bull Run, slave owners often forced African American men to serve as Confederate soldiers. Although a freeman by the time the Civil War started, Shack was aware of the consequences that might have resulted in his refusal to serve in the Confederate army.
By the 1850s, Shack was “a first-class barbecue cook,” often preparing barbecue all over the Pittsylvania County region of Virginia. He was also a popular barbecue cook among North Carolinians, as they, too, often called on him to come to their state to cook old Virginia barbecue.
At the start of the Civil War, the commander of the Thirty-Eighth Virginia Regiment, Captain Jones, enlisted Shack to be the cook at his headquarters. Shortly thereafter, the regiment endured heavy fighting. Although he performed his cooking duties well, when the bullets started flying Shack dropped his cooking utensils and took up a musket. However, he would never fire it. Whenever he went to the battlefield, Shack went there to save lives, not to take them.
When Shack saw a man fall from a Minié ball or shrapnel, he would rush out in the rain of bullets, take up the wounded man and carry him to the rear. He cared for each man until he was transported to a field hospital. Witnesses say that Shack never once dropped his musket in spite of dodging bullets and artillery fire as he carried wounded man after wounded man to safety.
Shack endured the entire war by saving, cooking for and caring for wounded men. When there was a break from fighting, he joined other soldiers in target practice and did “as good shooting on the firing line as any man in the old Thirty-eighth Virginia Regiment.” At Appomattox, Shack joined the line with all the other soldiers and wept as he surrendered his musket. However, unlike the other soldiers, Shack was probably shedding tears of joy because he knew that the South’s defeat meant the end of slavery.
During Reconstruction, Shack became a farmer while continuing to cook barbecue. However, on the day that officials tried to rob him of his right to vote as a citizen and veteran of the Civil War, there just so happened to be several other Confederate veterans there who had also come to register to
vote. About a dozen of them recognized Shack. Upon hearing that officials had turned Shack away, they were incensed. One of the men rushed up to the clerk with tears in his eyes demanding that he register Shack to vote, declaring, “By thunder, he shall register as a Confederate soldier, for no braver one followed old Mars’ Bob…from Bethel to Appomattox.”
Surrendering to the demands of the angry crowd, the clerks registered Shack as a voter with no further questions asked.
Long time no post. I made a promise to you all that, one day, I would be able to share with you the story of the man who inspired Shack Attack. Here it is. This is pretty much a direct quote out of my book so, please, don't share it outside of the Brethren forum. If you are not familiar with Shack sauce, here is the original thread.
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/showthread.php?t=136085
Shackleford Pounds
A result of the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1901–2 was the disenfranchisement of poor people, especially people of color. If a man couldn’t pay the poll tax, he couldn’t vote. However, Confederate veterans of the Civil War were exempt from the tax. Nevertheless, soon after the new state constitution was established, officials turned away Shackelford Pounds, a heroic African American veteran of the Civil War, when he attempted to register to vote in his Pittsylvania County, Virginia, voting precinct.
In 1861, Frederick Douglass commented on the many African Americans in the Confederate army who, at the time, were serving as cooks, servants, laborers and soldiers. In our times, neo-Confederates cite Douglass’s comments in an effort to insinuate that African Americans willingly fought for the principles of the Confederacy. However, it is a stretch of logic to think that slaves would risk life and limb fighting to remain enslaved.
According to an enslaved man named John Parker who fought for the Confederacy at Bull Run, slave owners often forced African American men to serve as Confederate soldiers. Although a freeman by the time the Civil War started, Shack was aware of the consequences that might have resulted in his refusal to serve in the Confederate army.
By the 1850s, Shack was “a first-class barbecue cook,” often preparing barbecue all over the Pittsylvania County region of Virginia. He was also a popular barbecue cook among North Carolinians, as they, too, often called on him to come to their state to cook old Virginia barbecue.
At the start of the Civil War, the commander of the Thirty-Eighth Virginia Regiment, Captain Jones, enlisted Shack to be the cook at his headquarters. Shortly thereafter, the regiment endured heavy fighting. Although he performed his cooking duties well, when the bullets started flying Shack dropped his cooking utensils and took up a musket. However, he would never fire it. Whenever he went to the battlefield, Shack went there to save lives, not to take them.
When Shack saw a man fall from a Minié ball or shrapnel, he would rush out in the rain of bullets, take up the wounded man and carry him to the rear. He cared for each man until he was transported to a field hospital. Witnesses say that Shack never once dropped his musket in spite of dodging bullets and artillery fire as he carried wounded man after wounded man to safety.
Shack endured the entire war by saving, cooking for and caring for wounded men. When there was a break from fighting, he joined other soldiers in target practice and did “as good shooting on the firing line as any man in the old Thirty-eighth Virginia Regiment.” At Appomattox, Shack joined the line with all the other soldiers and wept as he surrendered his musket. However, unlike the other soldiers, Shack was probably shedding tears of joy because he knew that the South’s defeat meant the end of slavery.
During Reconstruction, Shack became a farmer while continuing to cook barbecue. However, on the day that officials tried to rob him of his right to vote as a citizen and veteran of the Civil War, there just so happened to be several other Confederate veterans there who had also come to register to
vote. About a dozen of them recognized Shack. Upon hearing that officials had turned Shack away, they were incensed. One of the men rushed up to the clerk with tears in his eyes demanding that he register Shack to vote, declaring, “By thunder, he shall register as a Confederate soldier, for no braver one followed old Mars’ Bob…from Bethel to Appomattox.”
Surrendering to the demands of the angry crowd, the clerks registered Shack as a voter with no further questions asked.
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