'Lewis Redmond, The King of the Moonshiners' Unravels the Story

Lewis Redmond—moonshiner, murderer, notorious outlaw or folk hero? In “King of the Moonshiners: Lewis R. Redmond in Fact and Fiction” historian Bruce Stewart brings together Redmond’s family history, a sympathetic newspaper interview, a dime novel depicting Redmond as a hero, the arresting deputy’s report and an array of articles to unravel the true story.

Old postcard depicting a mountain moonshine still.

Lewis Redmond was raised in Transylvania County during the Reconstruction Period when the political climate was highly charged. A moonshiner by trade, Redmond’s real trouble began on March 1, 1876 when he killed U.S. deputy marshal Alfred Duckworth who was serving a warrant against Redmond for illegal distilling. 

Redmond escaped into Pickens County, SC where a five year conflict between Redmond, his cohorts and supporters and the Bureau of Internal Revenue played out.  At the time, Revenuers were viewed as carpetbaggers, and thus the real criminals, by many former Confederates. Plus Redmond cast himself as the victim in a July 1878 Charleston News and Courier article that wrote, he was “an honorable man who protected his family and community from corrupt federal agents.”

As the national media picked up the story Redmond became a larger-than-life figure and the anti-hero of a dime novel. Stewart includes the novel, “Entwined Lives of Miss Gabriel Austin, Daughter of the Late Rev. Ellis C. Austin, and of Redmond, the Outlaw, Leader of the North Carolina ‘Moonshiners’” by Bishop Edward B. Crittenden published in 1879, in this biography of Redmond.

Also included is Deputy Collector Robert A. Cobb’s “The True Life of Maj. Lewis Richard Redmond, the Notorious Outlaw and Famous Moonshiner of Western North Carolina.” Cobb and his men arrested Redmond on April 7, 1881.

After just three years in prison Redmond was pardoned and lived out the remainder of his life relatively quietly in upstate South Carolina. “King of the Moonshiners” separates the facts in this legendary Transylvanian’s life from the fiction and is available to be checked out at the Transylvania County Library.

Photographs and information for this column are provided by the Rowell Bosse North Carolina Room, Transylvania County Library. Visit the NC Room during regular library hours (Monday-Friday) to learn more about our history and see additional photographs. For more information, comments, or suggestions contact Marcy at marcy.thompson@transylvaniacounty.org or 828-884-1820.