The daughter of farmer/part-time musician William Pugh and his wife Mildred Russell, Virginia Wynette Pugh was born on a cotton farm in Itawamba County, Mississippi where she was quickly introduced to the harsh lifestyle of the cotton fields.
Before his daughter's first birthday William died of a brain tumor, forcing Mildred to relocate to Birmingham, Alabama in order to find work at one of the factories producing airplanes for the Second World War; Wynette (or "Nettie", as she was usually called at the time) was left on the farm in the care of her grandparents, where she was put to work picking cotton by the age of 7.
Throughout her pre-teen years, music -- whether gospel singing with her grandmother or the piano and guitar left behind by her father -- would provide young Nettie's only escape from the relentless tedium of her life. | 
