The Coon Hunt

The Coon Hunt

On Oct 5th, 1948 Grandpa Kader Lewis drove up to our tar paper shack on the edge of the Dismal Swamps. It was jest after sundown and I could see the dim headlights on his 1929 Studebaker truck bouncing from the ruts as he threaded his way through the sweet gum trees. I was 12 years old and Grandpa and me were going cooning. His hounds were yelping in the back of the truck and I was pretty excited too as I stood holding the bull’s eye lantern and a burlap tote bag to bring back any coons we got. We didn't have far to go before we came to one of the black water cricks where we had seen coon tracks earlier that day. Black water differs from the normal fresh water you see, in that it is so dark from the tannic acid from leaves and other organic matter that you can hold up a glass full of the stuff and not be able to see through it. We jest called it black water. Weren’t fit to drink either. Soon enough Ole Blue and Buster and Pepper, ran up a coon and we jest laid back on the crick bank and listened to them sing. It was a moonlight night and the deep baying of Ole Blue and sharp yelping of Pepper was harmonized by the yodel of Buster. I can sit here now and still hear those hounds singing through the Dismals. Soon enough the three of them started the sharp crying that let me and Grandpa know they had a coon treed and we took off running through the swamps toward them. When we finally got up with them, they had treed a coon in about the biggest sweet gum tree I have ever seen. It went up quite aways. That tree was about 6 feet across at the base and slick up to the first limb, which was about 15 feet up.

Grandpa was a long lean swamper and he said to me "Boy you stay rite chere and I'll go up and send that coon down to you. He stuck his walking stick behind the straps of his coveralls and digging in his fingers and toes started inching his way up that tree. After about 20 feet or so up, I couldn't see him anymore and started to get a little 'lonesome'. So I kinda worked my way up that tree and stood waiting for him on that first limb. After awhile I heard him whacking at that coon and sure as shootin' here that coon came falling by me and hit the ground with a kerthump. He didn't move any and I figured he was knocked out or dead from the fall. In just a bit here comes Grandpa and I stepped back on the limb and in a minute he was standing beside me. Grandpa kinda smiled at me turned to the side and stepped off the limb and fell the 15 feet to the ground. He hits it with a whump and just laid there wheezing and trying to get his breath back. By that time I had clumb back down the tree and hep'ed him to his feet. He stood lookin' at me and then back up to the limb and then took his walking stick and started whacking me with it. "Dern it boy, when I tells you to stay in one spot I means stay in that dern spot." It turns out that when he got to the limb, he figured he was standing back on the ground.

-Bob Gurkin