Stonewall Jackson (November 6, 1932 – December 4, 2021) was an American country music singer and musician who achieved his greatest fame during country’s “golden” honky tonk era of the 1950s and early 1960s.
Stonewall Jackson was born in Tabor City, North Carolina the youngest of three children. Stonewall is not a nickname, he was named after Confederate General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson.
When Stonewall Jackson was two, his father died and his mother moved the family to Worth County in South Georgia, where he grew up working on his uncle’s farm. In 1950 Stonewall Jackson enlisted in the Navy and served until 1954.
Stonewall moved to Nashville, Tennessee in 1956 to start his music career.
After hearing Stonewall Jackson’s demo tape, Wesley Rose, president of Acuff-Rose Music, arranged for Jackson to audition for the Grand Ole Opry, and Stonewall Jackson became the first artist to join the Opry before even having a recording contract.
Stonewall toured with Ernest Tubb, who became his mentor and signed with Columbia Records in 1958.
His breakthrough came in the country Top 40 in late 1958, with a song written by a young George Jones, “Life to Go”, which peaked at Number 2 in early 1959.
His follow-up record, “Waterloo”, was Number 1 for five weeks, and crossed over into the Top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100 chart, where it reached Number 4. The track also reached Number 24 in the UK Singles Chart in July 1959, sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc. “Waterloo” was a haunting and catchy tune that states “Everybody has to meet his Waterloo”, meaning their fate. The song cites Adam, Napoleon and Tom Dooley as examples.
His next Number 1 hits came in 1964 with “Don’t Be Angry” and “B.J. the D.J.” (Jackson’s foray into the teenage tragedy song trope, about an over-worked country music radio station disc jockey, who crashes his car in a rainstorm).
In 1971, Stonewall Jackson was the first artist to record a live album from the Grand Ole Opry with “Recorded Live At The Grand Ole Opry”.
His other hit songs include “The Carpet on the Floor”, “Why I’m Walkin'”, “A Wound Time Can’t Erase”, and “I Washed My Hands In Muddy Water”.
Stonewall Jackson also recorded a cover version of Lobo’s 1971 hit, “Me and You and a Dog Named Boo”, which became his final top 10 hit.
From 1958 to 1971, Stonewall Jackson had an amazing 35 Top 40 country hits.
In 2006, Stonewall Jackson sued the Grand Ole Opry for $10 million in compensatory damages and $10 million in punitive damages, claiming age discrimination. As a member of the Opry for over fifty years, Stonewall Jackson believed management was sidelining him in favor of younger artists.
In his court filing, Jackson claimed that Opry general manager Pete Fisher stated that he did not “want any gray hairs on that stage or in the audience, and before I’m done there won’t be any.” Fisher is also alleged to have told Jackson that he was “too old and too country”.
The lawsuit was settled on October 3, 2008 for an undisclosed amount and Stonewall Jackson returned to performing on the show. He was a member of the Grand Ole Opry from 1956 until his death. He largely retired from performing by 2012, with his last public performance being at the funeral of his longtime friend George Jones.
Stonewall Jackson lived on a farm in Brentwood, Tennessee where his wife Juanita died on January 11, 2019. She was also his personal manager and operated his song publishing company, Turp Tunes, he had a son, Stonewall Jackson Jr.
Stonewall Jackson was inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame on October 11, 2012.
Stonewall Jackson died in Nashville, Tennessee, on December 4, 2021, at the age of 89.
Check out Stonewall Jackson on Amazon
