Hatfields and McCoys

[FinsnFur]

Anyone watching this world premier 3 day series on History Channel?
Kevin Costner says...if you thought you knew the story....you were all wrong.
So far the History Channel did an awesome job I think. This is some pretty interesting stuff, some tough to watch, some tough to believe.

[Todd Rahm]

I'm watching too Jimbo! So far I'm a like'n it!!!

[HaMeR]

We have it recorded. 


Unless it didn't record since I am the one that set it to record. 

[weedwalker]

I've been watching it. GREAT show!!

[HaMeR]

WOOHOO it recorded!!!!!!   



Uuhmmmm do any of you fellas know either of those families by chance?? 

[bambam]

My neighbor is the great-grandson of Ellison Hatfield. He works night shift and hasn't seen it yet, but from the history I have read and what he's told me , I don't think it is entirely accurate. I'm really anxious for him to watch it and see what he says. I'm always skeptical about shows like this because you can't trust Hollywood to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth.  Having said that, I do enjoy the show . It sure beats a lot of the other crap on TV.

[Hawks Feather]

I have watched the first two, but won't get to see tonight's until Friday.  The first two have been great.

Jerry

[FinsnFur]

This ones even better Hawk

[FinsnFur]

In 2003, after 138 years, a symbolic peace treaty was signed by 60 descendants from both families.
A final truce between the Hatfields & McCoys

Interesting

[JohnP]

I'm wondering how much is true and how much is BS.  I had no idea that it was so violent.  lawyers, even back then were worthless.

[HaMeR]

As with anything hollywood puts out there is gonna be some straying from the facts. I wondered the whole time we were watching it if the McCoys were really that passive of folks. Especially back in a time when horse theivery got you hung.  I figured Randall McCoy woulda laid into the Hatfield for stealing that pig right there along that fence row.

And if they were I'm afraid I would have lost that demeanor when my Daughter was shot running out the back into the woods. 

[Bopeye]

I was wondering if any of you guys were watching that? I loved it. Dad and I have planned a road trip in three weeks to that area, when we get back from getting mom in Nebraska.
I have spent the last two nights losing many hours of sleep, pouring over old pictures, articles, Wikipedia, Family Trees, Pikeville Kentucky history, Mingo county W.V. history, Tug River history, just about anything I can find on the subject. I had forgot Mingo county had also been the site of the Blair Mtn. miners war where several thousand miners marched south and were machined gunned and bombed by the government. The miners wore red handkerchiefs to identify each other, thus one definition of "Redneck" was born, but that's getting of the subject.
Out of the 80 or so articles, blogs, and so called authoritative accounts there is quite the disparity on what happened historically speaking. I do believe after watching each episode twice that Hollywood did just about as good as anyone possibly could to keep it correct. Some things seemed to have really been played up like the so called love affair between Johnsy and Roseanna. By most accounts it seems Johnsy just wanted a live in female for a bit with no intention of marrying. She lived with the Hatfields for several months when Johnsy's infidelity and no intent to marry showing through. She left and Randall didn't take her back.
Poor old "Cotton Top" was described in a couple places as "slow witted". I looked at an old grainy photo that could have been him. Looked like possible Down Syndrome, but I really couldn't tell for sure. I did feel sorry for him terribly in the show. Couldn't stand it.
Ellis Hatfield, the one killed by the 3 McCoys boys with 27 stab wounds and a pistol shot took two days to die. He, however, was married to a McCoy woman. Kinda crazy eh?
The 3 McCoys were tied to Paw Paw trees and "riddled with bullets" the day he died. Some accounts say "Devil Anse Hatfield" wasnt at the shooting near Matawan, but most agree he orchestrated it including taking the 3 boys from the constables.
Cap Hatfield's eye was maybe hurt by a tree falling, but some accounts say a percussion cap damaged the eye.
Devil Anse was described by one newspaper as "6' tall of devil and 180 pounds of hell". Died of Pneumonia supposedly. I think at 81, not sure.
Randall McCoy did burn in a fire, but supposedly it was a cook stove fire. He was 88 I think.
Randall McCoy was married to his first cousin. A couple articles said he had 2 grown sons killed when the house burned down, but most agree it was a son and a daughter. However, the mother seemed to have been beaten when comforting the fallen daughter. Who knows?
Uncle Jim Vance seemed to be about as vicious as shown according to most things I read.
Grapevine battle did have several Hatfields shot, killed or taken prisoner.
There are several Hatfields and McCoys around here. Whether they belonged to this bunch, I never asked. 
That's all I can think of for now, beside gotta go get my daughter. Later Taters.
Research the thing. It's quite interesting reading all the accounts. 

[JohnP]

Found this on Yahoo.

Kevin Costner as Devil Anse HatfieldThe History Channel made its own history with "Hatfields & McCoys." The miniseries drew the biggest audience ever for a nonsports eventâ€"twice.

More than a century later, the storied feud is as much about American mythology as it is a tale of Appalachian blood vengeance. The saga came on the heels of the divisive Civil War, which killed more Americans than any other military engagement and led West Virginia to secede from Confederate Virginia. The hostilities were never just one incident, but escalating grievances that included pig theft, turf arguments, broken romances and murder.

And sometimes, Americans just like to take sides in a feud.

The real McCoyâ€"spoiler alert: How real was the miniseries? Liberties, as they say, were taken:

Historians and educators were also brought in to vet the story, according to the show's producers, though writers "took such traditional liberties as compressing characters and the timing of events." (May 29, Christian Science Monitor)

Then again, the real story will probably never be known: Among other things, talking about oneself wasn't as popular back then as it is now. The Hatfields, headed by timber merchant William Anderson (aka Devil Anse), and the McCoys, whose patriarch Randolph "Old Randall" McCoy owned land and livestock, lived in Tug Valley within Kentucky and West Virginia. The two families shared kin, which made tracking who was on whose side difficult.

A rough timeline of the blood feud, according to the History Channel, Biography and other sources:
•Hatfields & McCoys1865: The militia group Logan Wildcats, which include Devil Anse, his uncle Jim Vance and other Hatfields, kills Asa Harmon McCoy, Randolph McCoy's brother. Since Asa served on the "wrong side" of the Civil War, his death doesn't start the feud, but animosities may be kindled.
•1878: If there's a beginning, this would be it: Randolph McCoy accuses Devil Anse's cousin, Floyd Hatfield, of porcine theft. Stealing valuable pigs was a pretty rare and therefore grievous offense in the farming valley. Favorable testimony by Bill Statonâ€"a McCoy married to a Hatfieldâ€"clears Floyd.
•1880: Two McCoys kill Staton a couple years later. One successfully claims self-defense in a murder trial. The same year, Johnse Hatfield, son of Devil Anse, gets it on with Roseanna McCoy, daughter of Randolph. She stays with the Hatfields, but Johnse dumps the pregnant girlfriend and marries her cousin, Nancy McCoy. (The baby died and a descendant claims Roseanna died of a broken heart before she was 30.)
•1882: In August, Randolph McCoy's three sons fight with Devil Anse's two brothers and inflict heavy injury on Ellison. The Hatfields take the sons from the authorities. When Ellison Hatfield, stabbed and shot in the back, dies from his wounds, all three brothers, tied to pawpaw bushes, are shot in a hail of bullets. The Hatfields are indicted, but not arrested.
•1887: Lawyer Perry Cline convinces the Kentucky governor to get a bounty on the Hatfields' heads. He also hires bounty hunter "Bad" Frank Phillips. Newspapers cover the feud, publicizing the bounty on their heads. (The University of Kentucky has digitized coverage here.)
•New Year's massacre, 1888: Devil Anse's son Cap and friend Jim Vance ambush the McCoy's home. Randolph McCoy hides in a pigpen, but son Calvin and daughter Alifair are killed, and wife Sarah is beaten. Within days, bounty hunter Phillips kills Jim Vance and captures nine Hatfields.
•1889: The Supreme Court rules that the Hatfields can be tried, and the trial ends with eight Hatfields and friends sentenced to life in prison. One man is hanged.
•1892: A railroad comes through Tug Valley, changing the mountainous culture forever into a coal-mining community.
•1914: Randolph McCoy, a ferry operator, dies at age 88 from cooking fire injuries. He had lost five out of 16 children to the feud.
•1922: Devin Anse Hatfield, 11 years after being baptized, dies of pneumonia at age 73.
•June 13, 2003: The Hatfields and the McCoys sign a peace agreement.

American law and the Supreme Court: The acrimony wasn't as lawless as contemporary accounts made it out to be: The clans also battled in court, be it over theft or murderâ€"although they were inclined to disagree with the verdicts with gunfire. Lawyer Cline, a distant cousin to Randolph McCoy, had lost 5,000 acres to his neighbor Devil Anse in court battles over the years. Plans to build a railroad now made that lost Tug Valley property even more valuable, so Cline's motives for rounding up the Hatfields have been suspected as more a financial grudge than a real penchant for justice. Litigiousness went to the highest court in the land in Mahon v. Justice (1888), when the Hatfields protested their arrest-by-posse, which dragged them across state lines into Kentucky. The case was really about state sovereignty and symbolized a battle between Kentucky and West Virginia.

[CCP]

I only have internet TV so have not seen it. However lots of guys at work have and talk about it so I am downloading it this weekend and will watch it.

[Hawks Feather]

I got to watch the third show last night and really enjoyed the series.  I don't know exactly how accurate it was, but it seemed as accurate as could be.  When you read history it just depends on who writes it down.  As for the 2003 truce, I think that was all a ploy to get one side or the other to feel safe.  One of them will get this started again and we will have a rerun of the Hatfields and McCoys.   :big grin:

Jerry

[Frogman]

I thought I read that only 12 people were killed in the feud.  Seems like in the TV version there were a lot more than that??  Early in my teaching career I taught school in Boone county WV.  I think Blair mountain was in Logan County which is between Boone and Mingo counties.  A good source for information about the mine wars in WV is, "Bloodletting in Appalachia" by Howard B. Lee.  There is also a move called "Matewan" about one incident in Mingo County.  A very interesting part of WV's history.  I enjoyed the History Channel series!!  By the way a relative of the Hatfields from the feud, Sid Hatfield, played a prominent role in the Matewan Massacre during the mine wars!  Seems he was quite a character.  He was later murdered on the court house steps in revenge for his part in the massacre!!

Jim

[slagmaker]

I had relatives that lived in the "Bloody Matewan" time period. Some of the family still retells stories about it