"Long Grabs" Tells It Like It Is-- Part 1

From the Nov. 23, 2013, Greenville (NC) Reflector "ECU librarian wins award for work" by Jane Dail.

Barry Munson is a librarian at East Carolina University in Greenville and one of his passions is the Civil War. In his free time he constantly is looking through old records and in old Civil War issues of the Fayetteville (NC) Observer, he kept coming across the name of a contributor to the paper who simply referred to himself as "Long Grabs."

"Long Grabs" was also a Confederate soldier. Munson said that few correspondents back then signed their real name and in that way essentially could say anything they wanted.

Munson was determined to learn just exactly who this man was. He found out that he was a member of the 26th North Carolina at the Battle of Petersburg and that he had been shot between the eyes. While examining the regiment's roster, he found that a soldier named Murdoch John McSween had been wounded in such manner, but had survived and there was also an obituary in 1880 in a Salisbury newspaper.

"In essence it said he was a popular writer for the Fayetteville Observer who was known as Long Grabs, said Munson. "Aha, I have it!"

So, What Did He Write About. --Old Secesh