When I was young, I helped in the gardens and barns, picking pears and gathering chicken eggs and sometimes duck eggs from the pond. Just about everyone here did, growing up. I'd watch intently as my grandmothers canned the beans and tomatoes, cracking the whip of country wisdom and making something almost eternal, like scientists in a lab. God strike me if I'm lying, but I'll bet you anything they've still got some of those jars that six-year-old me watched them can!
I grew up being told to get “warshed” up for dinner, to get a mint from Nana's “poke” bag during church while Papaw preached. I was raised on porch swings, old men trading news over a coffee or beer, wives and sisters standing outside talking on warm summer nights until the wee hours of the morning. My alarm clock was the morning sun and the occasional rooster; my lullaby was often the howls of coyotes while fireflies carried stars down from heaven.
I have always had a wonderful relationship with animals—I think everyone from here does. However, I think I was almost to the point of giving Mama a heart attack. I'd wander off and play beneath a bull in a cow field, or tangle with a copperhead my daddy caught in a minnow trap. Mama said I had snake charmer's blood, meaning a person who isn't easily bit by snakes because of some charm naturally cast by the holder. We were around wild animals every day, and we respected them and they respected us. This added to my relationship with the land as nature, and its inhabitants became not only a window into God, but also a window into myself, reflecting back to me the good and the bad, like water pooling in the still eddies off the creek. Animals and plants play a very large role in the way we're born, live, cook, clean, work, and die, so of course they have a role in Appalachian folk magic and the work of a hilltop conjure man.
We grew up on stories of witches and family encounters with the Devil; stories of local spirits and creatures that roam the hills. My grandfather was a faith healer who had the sight. He cured thrush and warts, stopped blood with a prayer, and stole a fever with an egg. His mama may have also done this work. I never met Mamaw Seagle, but my mother has told me stories of her home on Pine Street in Johnson City, Tennessee, that the walls seemed like they were breathing, and there would be cold spots in the dead of summer even though Mamaw didn't have an air conditioner. Mama said she always had oil lamps going and something burning with a musky smell on the stove. She loved the woman to death, but she hated going to her home. My maternal great-grandmother, Sadie Mae, from the melungeon1 side of my mother's family, used to make dolls and hide them for some reason. Her husband, a white man, we think was a conjure man also due to a photo we found of him posing with a doll that has black feathers attached to it.
Mama also has the Gift as a seventh daughter. Her mama has the sight, too; anything she says has passed and will pass. She has always had those weird quirks that everybody notices but doesn't put much thought into. I think she enjoyed it until I came along! See, I was born “blue,” which is said to be an indicator of the Gift or the sight in Appalachia. Being born breech, sunny-side up (that is, faceup instead of facedown), or with a veil over the eyes (when the baby has part of the amniotic sac covering its head or face) was dangerous for the child, and many died—so it was said that those who survived were extremely lucky, born from the jaws of death, and walk that line until they enter the grave.
When my elders began passing away, I dedicated myself to collecting this lore, and keeping track of the beliefs and tales I heard growing up. Being born blue, I grew up hearing things that weren't said aloud by anyone present, knowing what someone was going to say before they said it or how they were faring, and sensing what was about to happen. My sister, a “left twin,” or a surviving twin since our sister died in the womb before birth, also has these gifts. These occurrences, like speaking with the dead openly, laying salt and cinnamon at the doors, or being healed by my mother's hands instead of the doctor, weren't anything strange to us.
There have been many books coming forth to help preserve our culture: how we pray, how we cook and eat, what toys our kids play with, how we work and dress, how we birth and bury our own. However, largely kept to the side, out of sight and out of mind, are the secret doings of how we handled when the deck was stacked against us: those secrets kept in the home, or those secret ventures to meet that one person everybody was wary of. Folk magic and conjure have played a big role in Appalachian life for centuries, being a mix of cultural beliefs from the native tribes such as the Cherokee and the immigrant people who settled here: Germans, English, and Scotts-Irish. And it's high time that folks knew it and quit throwing it off as simple old wives' tales. Back in the day, these folks weren't talked about much, let alone written about, so many of the stories that have remained are oral stories passed around. That is the reason for my writing: to help preserve these traditions and, in a way, to revive that culture of superstition and tales that is unique to southern Appalachia. First we will meet some of the key figures in Appalachian folk magic, understand them and the tales that remain. Then it's off to the top of the mountain to meet the roots of money, love, and justice and see how they are worked.
1 Melungeon is a term used for triracial people in east Tennessee. We are mostly thought to be a mixture of European, Portuguese, Native American, and African, often characterized by our dark hair and olive skin. This term likely arises from the French word mélange, meaning “mixture.” Originally a slur denoting “dirty” or “tainted,” it has been reclaimed in recent times.
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WITCHCRAFT AND CONJURE IN APPALACHIA
Every man was his own doctor and priest back in the day, until as recently as the early to mid-twentieth century, when Western medicine and stationary preachers became more abundant. Before that, every family or community had usually one to three people who helped with a range of ailments, from bleeding and infections to nightmares and supposed curses. These same folks would also deliver babies, perform baptisms, marry couples, and bury the deceased. Now the folks who did this were as varied as their titles, but the most fascinating character in the hills was the root person. This was the old woman who knew everything whispered in the dark, and the man who came over the hills to cure you of a curse, holding a bucket of vomited crickets and salamanders.
God listens to our prayers and knows what we need. But we Appalachian Americans have a certain self-reliance. We were left to fend for ourselves for the longest time while simultaneously being robbed of resources by outsiders, whether it was coal or timber or what have you. There wasn't anything else here they wanted or cared for to the point some transport trains didn't even stop here for anything but to fuel up. Therefore there was rarely a train that came through with news of the outside world or anything like that. Otherwise it was us and God. We didn't have preachers or priests down the road to pray for us—we prayed for each other. The preachers we did have were circuit riders who traveled from community to community constantly, maybe staying in one place for a week to preach, baptize, or bless. Otherwise, it was just us, fending for ourselves, growing our own food and making our own work.
Because we were all taught that God only gives you what you can handle, we will try everything to make ends meet before giving up and giving it to God. And a good first step before seeking His help is to find the conjurer or root person of the community. These healers had a way about them, a way of seeing and walking, that allowed them to speak with the spirits to bring about change. The way it was taught to me is that everybody's life is like a water pipe: it flows and flows, but sometimes things get clogged up to the point where the water (the person) can't overcome it on their own; so they call up a friend first (root doctor) to see what the issue is and to see if it can be worked quick before calling the plumber (God), who works by their own time. This is what the doctor does; they move things around in your life to create the best and most beneficial flow for you.
TYPES OF WORKERS
There have been many kinds of mystical folks in these hills, each with his or her own title or name for their particular spiritual trade. Some folks stick to just one degree, such as faith healing, while others cross barriers, drawing on several practices or methods. There are many, many names that denote the same type of worker. For our purposes, we will stick with the most common titles and names that most are familiar with.
Faith Healers
Faith healers, also known as high men or power doctors, aid with ailments by the movements of their hands, the ease of their breath, and the power of prayer. The word power here may be a corruption of the title used in northern Appalachia: powwow being changed to powower, and eventually to the current form. Faith healers might also be known as fire talkers, wart charmers, thrush doctors, blood stoppers, and more, which alludes to their specialties.
Root and Yarb Doctors
Root and yarb doctors, also sometimes called remedy men, help people using roots and bark. Yarb is a corruption of the word herb and was mostly used in the hills and mountains, while herb doctor was the term used in the valleys and cities. The folks who cure in this manner were known in their communities as the local doctor, and they often had titles attached to their names.
Oftentimes, for a woman, regardless of age or parenthood, she was called granny, mammy, aunt, or maw before her name, so Mammy Smith or Granny Easle. This was a term of respect and endearment. Men were called doc, doctor, uncle, or paw. In researching my family lineage, I have found a handful of grandfathers and uncles who are named on census records and other documents as doc so-and-so, although there's no record of them being anything but a farmer or other worker. This could be an indication of their possible side profession as a yarb doctor.
Men who were seventh sons, or the seventh son of a seventh son, were also given the nickname “Doc” due to the belief that men born as the seventh son were destined to be healers in some manner. The widely known granny woman, who was usually the midwife, also aided with minor maladies such as cracking feet, cuts or bruises, colic, and the like, but usually didn't perform surgery or bloodletting, or prescribe any “store doctor” drugs such as mercury or Indian vegetable pills, an old-time cure-all that was sold back then for a wide variety of ailments. This was during the time when folks were getting used to pharmacies popping up, and we are sure stubborn creatures of habit, so we never let go of our herbs (that is, until recently, once folks stopped passing down remedies).
Cow and Horse Doctors
There were also doctors who specialized solely in animals and livestock. They often used herbs gathered from the land or liniments and other drugs from the local drugstore prepared in at-home ways to heal animals. These were often simply called cow or horse doctors, although there's little record of this title being added to anyone's name. Both root doctors and cow or horse doctors sometimes also employed practices of Western medicine used at the time, such as bloodletting, cupping, vaccine administration, and even surgery.
Witchdoctors, Conjurers, Root Workers, Hex Doctors, Witch Finders, and Love Doctors
Next, we have the witchdoctor, the conjurer, the root worker, the hex doctor, the witch finder, and the love doctor. The witchdoctor and conjurers, or the root worker (as opposed to root doctor), worked roots not only for medicine of the body but also for the mind and spirit. Horton Cooper calls them “hex doctors,” which is a carryover from Germany, where the word hexen means “witch.” The hex doctor sold powders and roots such as Adam and Eve root (an orchid native to the mountains) and High John the Conqueror root. There were also love doctors, who aided folks in finding and keeping love or calling a lover back home. They gave powders to be sprinkled in the lover's path or directly on them, created the hex or root, and doctored it.
While many know this as conjure or root work, those raised in the work and in the know called it “doctoring the devil,” whether you're doctoring a root for someone or doctoring them of a root they're currently under. This title acknowledges how fine the line is between God and the Devil. It's easy to sway with the power.
Folk Magic versus Conjure
Some say anyone can become a true conjurer or witchdoctor, while others say you have to have a gift for it in order to do it right. Here is where I will make the distinction, as I see it, between folk magic and conjure. Folk magic or root work is the magical act of using roots and things to influence, incapacitate, attract, avert, or change a situation of the present or future in some manner. This includes superstitions such as tossing salt over your shoulder, exiting the same door you entered through lest your spirit get trapped, turning your pockets inside out to avert bad luck, and carrying a buckeye or walnut in the pocket for luck or to ease arthritis. These kinds of things are practiced knowingly or out of habit by the majority of folks in Appalachia. Folk magic is any superstitious action taken without an appeal or prayer to a higher spirit or divinity that is alleged to cause a supernatural result. It works by belief, the power of the person with the root, and the power of the action taken. Much of Appalachian folk magic and superstition is based on sympathetic magic where like actions create like causes, such as turning your pockets inside out to also turn inside out or away the bad luck. The power behind these was furthered in our picking them up from the old folks without question. Without question because we see that they work!
Conjure, on the other hand, is the direct and intentional employment of spirits, whether they be spirits of the graveyard, the ancestors, simple spirits of the land you live on, or some other presence, to work on your behalf. This also includes angels and God. Yes, God is worked with here. He is the first conjurer, after all, conjuring up the world in seven days. Conjure is root work and folk magic but with a helping hand, whether it's helping you get a bird's-eye view of a situation or taking care of things for you. Conjurers are experts when it comes to the unseen: they know how to deal with it, make it, handle it, cure it, or repel it. They take folk magic a bit deeper and knowingly work and twist the hand of nature in their favor.
We walk both here and in spirit simultaneously, and sometimes continuously. It's nothing for me to walk down the streets in Old Jonesborough and have a conversation with both the neighborly shop owners as well as the spirits that wander the roads alongside them. Growing up, and still to this day, I'll see my mother and grandmother speak about or to spirits they see. Nana sometimes sees a woman out the window, standing at the crossroads. She'll wave, but she says the woman doesn't wave back. Nana has also seen many people across the street throwing a barbecue, yet no one is physically in the yard.
In Appalachia, among those with the Gift and the sight, the veil between the living and the dead is very thin, sometimes nonexistent. If someone doesn't know what's going on or why they keep seeing things, it can very well drive them mad. Because they're scared, they don't know what's going on, and they can't tell what is physically there and what's not. It can't be controlled, only slipped into like a suit. However, at the beginning the suit can wear you instead of you wearing it!
DEGREES OF PRACTICE
I'm going to explain the difference between each degree of practitioners here, but be mindful they often cross and intersect a lot, examples of which we will see later. So there may be some faith healers who are also yarb or root doctors. There may be some root doctors who are also root workers, using roots to aid not only the body but also the mind and soul. Furthermore, anyone could be a little bit of all: a faith healer who uses roots to heal and to bring money, love, or justice. Then they may stay separate altogether, based on upbringing and personal belief. I've met some faith healers who'll have nothing to do with working roots because they believe that it's evil or that they can't handle the power. There are also tales of yarb doctors disbelieving that roots can draw money or that you can conjure the dead or other spirits. So this isn't a set area, but an array of beliefs and degrees of practice separated only by the hills of our ancestors.
Taking into account the actions and practices by the other working folks prior, there's a bit of both folk magic and conjure done by each, whether some are aware of it or not. The degrees of faith healing, root doctoring, and conjuring often overlap. The faith healers pray to the angels and to God to aid in healing using Bible verses, so naturally it includes a certain degree of conjuring, not only in the aspect of calling on spiritual aid but also in hand movements or superstitious practices as well, such as my grandfather using an egg to take out a fever by passing the egg over the head a certain way with prayers; he was not only praying to God for relief, his hands were working in the relief by conjuring the fever out and into a more suitable home that can take its heat: the egg.
Sometimes the healer would give the person restrictions on diet or activities based on superstitious belief. For example, for swellings it would be recommended to abstain from fish or anything caught from the water until the third Sunday after the swelling had subsided. In the case of burns, once the “fire” was gone, you had to wait for that window to close, a window in which the “fire” could hop back into the burn. This is why folklore often recommends refraining from lighting fires or using matches and lighters until after a burn has healed. If a burn is allowed to fester with the “fire” still in it, it will reach the bone and cause a scar. But those able to reach a burn doctor in time often had complete recovery with no scarring, regardless of the severity of the burn.
Preachers also sometimes resort to divination to speak with God and the spirits through bibliomancy: opening the Bible to a random page and verse after a question or need has been stated to find the answer or solution on said page. Nana and Papaw did this and said if you ask a question and open the Bible to a verse where Christ is speaking, or to a verse that begins “and it came to pass,” then that is a strong yes to your question.
The yarb or root doctor healed with herbs and usually didn't stick with the simple physical medicine of pills and herb, and these were numerous throughout the region. Just about anyone could pick up a copy of Gunn's Domestic Medicine, get a horse, a bag, a lancet, and a few drugs and other tools and call himself a doctor or physician. John C. Gunn specifically wrote his book for these folks. In the event that a “trained” physician couldn't be reached, it taught you what to do until such a time. Because the normal man could do this, the varying degrees of method and belief in their practices are numerous.
If you've been having a run of bad luck with your health, they might've recommended a certain herb or concoction for the illness but also may have advised taking castor oil for a number of days, due to the belief that castor oil helps purge the body of impurities, including jinxes and tricks. Certain tricks were also hidden in food and found their way into the body by polluting the blood or stomach. In Appalachian folk medicine, many still believe that diseases can be caused by many things: dead animals, tainted food, bathroom fumes, ancestors, demons, spells. The blood allegedly becomes polluted by organic matter that comes into the body via the air or food and drink. This can set up imbalances in the body or cause food to get lodged in the intestines and begin to rot, setting the stage for disease. Here also dietary restrictions may be given. For example, some say don't eat chocolate or drink coffee because it can make rheumatism or arthritis worsen.
Back in the day, tricks such as powdered spider eggs, horsehair, and other such things were introduced into someone's food to conjure them. Spider eggs were often cooked into dumplings or powdered in with ice cream, so again dietary restrictions were advised if this was thought to be the suspect. The work then gets in the body and pollutes it, and the person becomes “rooted,” “witched,” or “hexed.”
Conjure and folk magic sometimes crossed into the realm of the yarb doctor or herb healer, and they also used herbs, purgatives, and washes to help expel “roots” from the body. The yarb or root doctor could be seen praying or reciting Bible verses while creating teas, salves, or compresses, or doing divination, to understand the severity of the person's illness and to see if they'd make it. (The most common form of divination throughout the hills was tea or coffee readings. These were often done for entertainment during hog killings, wakes, and house bees, a time when the whole neighborhood came together to help build a home for a family from hewn logs.)
