Even the crickets here in the holler hold their breath sometimes.

You can feel it in the air, a tension thicker than summer humidity.

Hatfields and McCoys, they say, been at it since before the war, those two families.

My pappy used to tell stories about Devil Anse Hatfield, meanest son of

a gun, this side of the Mississippi.

Had 13 kids, all cut from the same onery cloth.

Over on the Kentucky side, there was Randolph McCoy, Ol Randall.

They used to call them.

Same story, a brood of boys itching for a fight.

It all started with the pig, some folks say.

Stolen or not stolen, depending on who you ask.

But that was just the spark.

The real fire came later, with guns blazing across the Tug Fork,

men dying over land and pride.

My cousin Asa, poor fella, caught in the crossfire, left a hole in

our family that'll never mend.

This here's the story of the Hatfield McCoy feud, a saga of hatred and

revenge that tore these hills apart.

We'll meet the families, hear the gunshots echo through the hollers, and

see if there's any truth to the whispers of a star crossed love affair that

bloomed in the shadow of all that hate.

So pull up a chair by the fire, cause this ain't gonna be a pretty

tale, but it's one worth hearing.

Welcome to Talk With History.

I'm your host, Scott, here with my wife and historian, Jen.

On this podcast, we give you insights to our history inspired world travels,

YouTube channel journey, and examine history through deeper conversations

with the curious, the explorers, and the history lovers out there.

And Jen, I'm just going to jump right into it.

We are talking about a very popular, very famous family

feud about the Hatfield McCoys.

We're going to go right into American folklore that happens

to be based in actual history.

Yeah, and this was kind of a fun one because you and I

got some time away from the kids.

My mom was watching the kids.

And so we just kind of headed due west and started driving out towards

the Kentucky Virginia border area.

Did some other history topics we've talked about before, but we discovered

we were in Hatfield McCoy country.

And it was amazing because we always wanted to do this story.

So being there, we just took full advantage of it.

And we started at the visitor center, which is basically.

the best place to go in Pikeville, Kentucky.

That was, it was, I'm so happy that we stopped there first

because we really got the best kind of lay of the land advice that

you could get, you could ask for.

And honestly, we both say it after that trip, we said the nicest people

we have met on our history travels through America were in Kentucky.

They were amazing.

They were, they were so friendly, like, cause sometimes you feel a little

bit like an interloper going around, especially with the camera, you're

saying, Hey, I'm looking for this.

I'm looking for that.

Not

No, they were so welcoming and open.

They treated us like family.

It was truly amazing.

So, I would say if you're going to do any Hatfield and McCoy travel

exploring, start in the visitors center in Pikeville, Kentucky.

And there's a couple of reasons you want to start there.

First of all, it's a cool little town.

there.

And we're

A lot of the history of the Hatfields and McCoys happens in Pikeville,

Kentucky, but You're going to get the best internet coverage there and we're going

to talk about that because once you start exploring outside of Pikeville, you're

in the hollers, you're in the back woods roads of West Virginia and Kentucky.

You're right along the border there.

And you're going to lose your internet coverage.

So if you're trying to find specific locations, you won't be able to GPS

them or look them up on your Google maps or whatever you use, Apple

maps, you won't be able to use it.

So at the visitor center, you can get a free brochure.

It's the Hatfields and McCoys historic feud driving tour.

And again,

this was in Pikeville,

Pikeville, Kentucky at the visitor center there.

And it's located at 831 Hambly Boulevard in Pikeville, Kentucky.

So it was a great guy there who helped us.

He was so, he was so open and friendly.

He kept telling us how Chris comes in all the time.

And, you know, Chris loves it here.

And I'm looking at him like, who, Chris, who?

who are we talking about?

I don't, I don't know.

I know many Chris's

like, okay.

And he's talking about Chris Stapleton, who, the country music singer, who we

have his record behind us in our podcast, Traveler, because we love his music.

We love the bluegrass.

We love the sound of it.

And I guess Chris Stapleton is from Pikeville, Kentucky.

there was a couple of other pretty well known actors and musicians,

is from there, Dwight Yoakam.

they call it like that was a country music highway.

through there.

But also there was an actor, most folks wouldn't quite know his name yet, but he's

been in some really big stuff on Netflix.

He was in like at the new, um, new version of justified.

also in Hatfields and McCoys,

He played one of the McCoys,

he plays one of the

of the Hatfields.

Yeah.

He plays the son.

from that

He's from that area.

And so, yeah, you're going to get, it's close to Loretta Lynn's house too.

So a lot of people will go to the visitor center.

to get information about visiting Loretta Lynn's cabin.

We have a whole episode on that where you go, where you get your tickets,

who you talk to, if you want to visit there, a lot of people will get that

information also from that visitor center.

So that visitor center is great for that.

And also if you're going to do the Hatfield to McCoy's get the driving tour,

you're going to want that brochure because it gives you step by step instructions.

After you get out of the city and you're not going to have your GPS

And it's nice too, because you can sit there and kind

of plan it out ahead of time.

Cause the driving tour could probably, if you do the whole thing, it'll

probably take you all day, but you can in advance kind of pick and choose

the spots you want to go, how much driving you actually want to do.

Plus you can actually start there in Pikeville at the, at

the, , the city courthouse.

There's a, there's a little museum there.

That's all about the Hatfield McCoys as well as some other stuff in the area.

Yeah, so it's the historic courthouse where they were put on trial.

The second floor courtroom is now become a museum and We went over there first

and we actually met an actual Hatfield

Yeah.

So we were, I told the story to a couple of folks.

We were driving around looking for parking near the courthouse and I pull up next

to a hospital and we pull up next to this hospital and we couldn't tell if it was

hospital only parking or if we could park there and have security guard walks up.

He's an older gentleman, probably in his early 60s, and he says, Hey,

he'd say, Hey, can I help you guys?

And we said, Hey, we're looking for parking.

You know, we're trying to go to the courthouse.

And so he had kind of pointed us off in another direction, just a little,

you know, just a little ways away.

And then you saw his name tag and his name tag said, Hatfield

Hatfield and so I asked him.

Are you a Hatfield?

Are you related to?

Devil Anse Hatfield and he said yeah, it's my great uncle and he actually owns the

land where they had the feud and the Kid the boys with the border where the boys

were shot where the McCoy boys were shot and we're gonna get into everything that

And he even said to us too, he is like, I guess the

Hatfield's won in the end.

And I was like, oh my gosh.

know.

We just laugh.

We're like, okay.

Yeah.

I mean he was, he was very kind.

He was very joking about it.

Very jovial.

Um, but yeah, we told him, we're like, oh my gosh, we're here to go see some of the

sites and visit some of the locations.

He's like, and he told us that, that little bit, but

only in Pikeville, Kentucky.

Yes.

Would you be driving around and just randomly run into one of the

Hatfields, one of the descendants of the

I know who actually lives on the

who actually lives on the land.

So that was pretty

So Let's, what we're going to do is like, let's talk about what

happened, the historic, what happened.

And then we'll talk about what you can see where, because in the city

of Pikeville, you can see a couple of things that are like the middle of

the story and the end of the story.

And you might be confused if you don't know the story.

Why would I, what is this place?

Why?

I don't want to mention it right away.

So I'd rather mention it in order of how it happened.

If you're gonna drive and visit, you're not gonna, you'd be ping

ponging all over the place to do that.

You would want to go to everywhere in Pikeville and then start to branch out.

So I will, let's do the whole story and then I'll tell you where you can go visit.

I also want to talk about, there's a lot of popularity around the Hatfields McCoys

because of the miniseries that came out with, , Kevin Costner and Bill Paxton.

Paxton, that's

I will say that miniseries is very accurate.

If you want to watch it we actually watched it.

I actually watched it while we were there again, because I hadn't seen it in

Yeah, I think I watched it after the fact.

Yeah.

it's very well acted.

They actually filmed it on location.

So all of those same places, they look just like that.

And They're very accurate with how they tell the story and

the timeline of the story.

They do a very good job.

So if you're interested in, in understanding more about the nuances

of the story and how things are really interconnected and these families

who just couldn't seem to get enough of each other watch that miniseries.

It's a three part miniseries.

It's act.

It's fantastic.

it's really good and that just that just goes to show how Incredible and

and almost like how crazy the true life story is that they didn't have to change

much to make it You know, it's a Hollywood

Yeah.

It's truth is stranger than fiction.

And remember, this has really played into American folklore.

I mean, you think about Star Trek and Doc McCoy is related to the McCoys like

this is supposed to be very inter grained into our American culture now, which

it is this Hatfield and McCoy feud.

But it all goes back to really the biggest feud of America.

It all really starts with the Civil War.

so so talk to me a little bit about How the Hatfields and McCoys

were involved in the Civil War?

And, and why that kind of was the genesis.

we're really dealing Here on the border of Kentucky and Virginia

Before it becomes West Virginia because West Virginia is a product of the

Civil War West Virginia is not a state before the Civil War, but because

there are so many people who are anti Confederacy in Virginia, they really

break away to start their own state and say, we want to be a union state.

We want to be part of the union.

We don't want to be part of this Confederacy.

was West Virginia that, that said that.

I made their own state West Virginia.

So here we have this border where the Hatfields are on one side,

the McCoy's are on the other.

The Hatfields are West Virginian and the McCoy's are Kentucky.

And.

They that's where you're gonna get a lot of families and brothers who are gonna

fight for either side because when you think about it This is a this is where

the West Virginians are gonna break away because they want pro union So you're

gonna get families and brothers who are like I I side with Kentucky I side with

Virginia hence, West Virginia so that That kind of is what happens here now, not

with the patriarchs that when we really talk about the Hatfields and McCoys,

there's two head men of these families.

You're going to get William Anderson Hatfield, devil anse on the Hatfield side.

And then you're going to get Randall, old Randall McCoy on the McCoy side.

They both fight for the Confederacy.

They both fight together for the Confederacy.

And in the mini series, that's, that is Kevin Costner and Bill

Yes.

They both feel like it's their duty.

McCoy really feels like it's his duty.

He wants to stay.

Hatfield, the devil anse, starts to see the Confederacy losing and

feels like it's a losing fight and he doesn't want to die for a lost cause.

So he, he basically leaves early and goes back to his land.

probably leaves like, like a year or two before the end of the

Before the end of the war and goes back to his land and then

he's able to start his business up and really get more solid business

They do like log logging and a lot of land

Yes, before McCoy can even get back home.

And that's, that's Bill

That's Bill Paxton.

And so you see McCoy kind of resentful of that fact.

Cause doesn't he get captured?

He does get captured at one point.

And so he has to survive

like, he's a prisoner of

prisoner of war, which if you know anything about civil war, prisoners

of war, both sides were horrible.

You can't even say the South was worse than the North.

They both treated their prisoners Terrible.

But that's not really where the feud starts.

Their friends, they're kind of, McCoy kind of pissed at Hadfield because he

Left

left early mad at him.

But that's not the feud.

What starts this whole feud and it, People like to say it was the Pig Trial.

The Pig Trial is really where it kind of gets really dug in, but the feud really

starts with a brother of McCoy, Asa Harmon McCoy, who served in the Union.

So here you got brothers who are serving for two separate

sides and Asa comes back home.

He's been captured.

He served time in a confederate prisoner of war camp.

He comes back home.

He's not even home for 13 days before he is killed and he's killed.

January 7th, 1865.

So, this is really before the end of the war.

He serves time, and he gets out early, and he comes back, and

it's Jim Vance, Vance is the uncle of Old Anse, so he's a Hatfield,

Tom Berringer in the miniseries.

it so

He's phenomenal.

So Tom Berringer plays, um, Kevin Costner's uncle.

Right.

Crazy.

Yeah, the crazy, this is like, you think about the crazy uncle?

This is back then, like, you know, West Virginia.

Crazy, crazy

Crazy uncle.

Who's a rebel, right?

He believes in the rebel cause.

So here comes a McCoy, home that fought for the Union, and he's mad.

Not, not only did he like, get captured as a prisoner of war, and

he, gets out and now he's back home.

This is before the end of the war.

He's mad.

So 13 days later, he's killed.

And so this is what starts the feud.

A McCoy is killed by the Hatfields.

And that's kind of what I was referring to as like, I'll

call it time traveling Scotty that did the intro there, right?

When you say like my cousin Asa, you know, because I had, there were so many brothers

and sisters, there's so much family on each side that really was the first

event that really kicked off this feud.

And when you think about it, there's these huge families, these

huge networks of families, right?

And that's who does all your farming.

That's who you, that's who does all your business with.

It's like you have six or seven brothers and sisters, and then

they have six or seven brothers and sisters and they have, so you have

these huge families on either side.

It doesn't mean they didn't intermarry.

Hatfield's McCoy is certainly intermarried, but they had these strong

family ties through the patriarch line.

And it's the McCoy brother who's killed by the Hatfield uncle

that starts this whole thing.

And we go to that location that is outside of the city.

It's by this little school.

I think it's called Blackberry.

Yeah.

Then there's a marker

There's a marker there.

That's a great place to be like, this is where it all started.

And.

You're going to get like this feud is going to last a while because

his widow starts to kind of, she starts to needle her way into

with lawyers and things like that.

So this is going to start the whole feud.

feud kind of goes on for a few decades.

yeah.

Oh yeah.

So I mean, it's going to be 13 years later when this hog trial happens.

So that's the first thing that happens.

It's not publicized that it was Jim Vance that did it.

Family tradition points to him.

He's part of that West Virginia militia group that is the rebels that did that.

application for his wife's pension from the union said he was killed by rebels.

So that's kind of like how people have pieced that together.

There's no existing records pertaining to his death.

There's no death record.

But when she goes for the pension, killed by rebels is what it says.

And

And I think even some of the markers don't specifically

call out the Hatfield, but they, they call out the group, but it's,

it's, it's, It's it's implied

a member was a leader of the group.

So, so, McCoy comes back from the end of the war.

So this happens in January 1865.

McCoy comes back at the end of the war and he starts to hear rumblings

and he's not, not only is he mad that Hadfield old Anse has left early

and been able to kind of keep his family going where McCoy's family has

basically just really barely gotten by.

Now he's here rumblings that his brother was killed by Hatfield.

So he just kind of, is upset about

Yeah bitter about

bitter about it, but it goes about his business and

starts to build their life back.

So if you go to the McCoy well, which is again on the outskirts of Pikeville,

but it's a great place to visit.

They have a a guy who lives there who loves giving tours,

Yeah, you if you drive up and if the guys you know, there's a

gentleman that lives right near the well Which is where their old home was

but if his garage is open, he's out.

He'll come right up to you I'm talking to you.

He came and she said hey come look at this stuff.

I have my garage and we were like, um You Excuse me.

And

Kevin Costner went and visited there and

he said he used to like give tours and stuff.

So it's random McCoy's.

Well, it's in Hardy, Kentucky.

So this is where McCoy's home was, and this is where the pig was.

And so the pig gets marked with the McCoy mark, which is basically two notches out

of its ear, wanders away onto the hill.

So if you stand on, at the McCoy well, which was behind their

house where they got their water.

Now they make alcohol from there.

You can buy the McCoy well, alcohol, moonshine or whatever.

Um, if you look up, you can see like a hill.

That's where the pig wandered onto the hill.

And that was Hatfield land, not old aunt's Hatfield land,

but one of his cousins land.

And so what happens is that that pig has gotten over there and the cousin

Floyd Hatfield, claimed it was his hog and he's taking it to slaughter,

walks by Randall McCoy and McCoy looks at his ears and says, those

are McCoy marks, not Hatfield marks.

And Floyd says, that pig has been on my land for a couple

of years now and it's mine.

And McCoy's like, that pig wandered away from my house

like three or four years ago.

We just thought, we just thought something happened to it.

Like, but you kept it.

That's my pig.

So they start arguing over who owns this

They start arguing on who owns this pig.

and you, you drove home too.

And I think you made it into the video about how valuable those hogs were.

And especially at that

at that time.

It's your livelihood.

It's feeding your family.

Basically, you could see it as Randall McCoy felt the Hatfields was stealing

food from his family's mouths.

It was that bad.

You're stealing another

And that, and that's why things started to get so

Yes, this happens in 1878.

So this is 13 years after Asa is killed.

So McCoy has let this fester for 13 years, right?

He hasn't brought anything up.

I don't think he's been perfect, particularly friendly to the Hatfields,

but I mean, they're still neighbors.

And, but he now he's mad.

He takes it to the justice of the peace.

And he wants He wants justice and the justice of the piece is Anderson Hatfield.

So it's, it's old and Hatfield's cousin

. Scott: Yeah.

It's another one of his cousins

Yes.

And so, and he's a well educated man, knows the law, but he's also from

Kentucky and he or in West Virginia, he's also Hatfield and he understands

family almost matters more than the law.

And so.

You can go to the cabin where this trial takes place and I would recommend

that is a that is a place you want to

Yeah, that was really cool because you're driving through,

you know, just to kind of step back and set the scene of where we are.

Like one of the things that I kind of wondered before we got out

there is like, what's a hauler?

Well, it's a bunch of little mini valleys, right?

You're driving through and it is beautiful land out there.

It's absolutely gorgeous driving through these haulers.

Like when we went up to Butcher Hauler to Loretta Lynn and driving

through these haulers was really cool.

So you really.

feel like you're there.

And then you come down and I think it's near like a post office.

Um,

it McCarr, Kentucky.

yeah.

And so you drive up and they had recreated the, the cabin there.

And so I think they call it the pig trial, hog trial cabin.

Um, and you know, it's, it's in good shape.

You know, I, I'm sure it's certain times of the year you

might be able to go inside.

We weren't able to,

, Jenn: look in the windows and it's

and there's other things that.

Aren't actually too far from that, from that cabin, some other markers that we'll

talk about a little bit, but it was just, it was beautiful time of year we were

there in October and it was so neat to do.

And if you're thinking about considering about going on these driving tour, I

highly recommend this as one of your

Yeah, it's in It's called the Preacher Anse Hatfield Hog Trial Cabin

and its location, it just gives you like a county road, 319 McCarr, Kentucky.

And that's kind of how you're going to have to get around there.

It really is like these old country roads.

So this is what the trial is going to take place.

Now.

I will say the uncle Anderson, Preacher Anderson, tried to

make it, tried to make it just.

He tried to put half of the Hatfields on the jury and half

of the McCoys on the jury.

The problem was that one of the McCoys was married to a Hatfield.

And like I said, these, they're intermarried.

And so, he was kind of a relative of both families and he.

said that he didn't, he didn't think that that mark was a McCoy mark.

And so that kind of pushed it.

And so Anderson Hatfield ruled in favor of the Hatfields.

So he sided with his wife's side, which was the Hatfield side.

so that, that makes McCoy even more mad.

Like finally, he's like, I didn't get justice for my brother.

Nobody cares.

I didn't get justice for my pig.

Nobody cares.

And so this is when the sons, the McCoy sons.

Start getting involved.

getting involved.

They really start to get upset.

So Hatfield has a couple of sons.

McCoy has a couple of sons.

Everyone's half is like 10

And daughters, right?

So Randall McCoy, right?

Who's the patriarch of the McCoy side.

His sons start getting involved and things start getting rowdy.

So it's in, it's two years later in June of 1880 that the, the

testimony of the relative of the McCoy's who was married to the Hatfield

is killed by two of the McCoy sons

like, hey, you betrayed.

They kind of in, in the miniseries, they kind of say, hey, you

betrayed our side of the family.

And they kill them.

and they kill him.

Now they are immediately arrested.

But the Hatfields catch him, they see them, him do that, and they take him

into trial, but they claim self defense.

And because nobody saw it, they say he came after us with a knife, which he

probably did because they threatened him that they were going to kill him.

So he pulls a knife and says, I'm going to defend myself.

And then they just kill him.

And so they claim self defense.

And you see in the, in the, in the mini series that Anderson Hatfield, the justice

of the piece is getting very mad now at this, at this point, because they're

using the law Which is true, but he can't.

He kind of bent the law in the first place for his cousin to win the hog trial.

Now the McCoys have bent the law in their favor to win the self defense trial.

And he just sees this escalating, right?

Now we've killed, a person was killed, Asa has been killed, a hog has been taken.

Now someone else has been killed.

So we kind of have a person on the McCoy side has been killed and a person

on the Hatfield side has been killed.

So that's where we're at right now.

This is 1880.

So it's kind of right now, an eye for an eye, but it's just going

to escalate now with a daughter.

Of course things start getting complicated when the,

when the girls start coming in.

So, Randall McCoy has a beautiful daughter named Rosanna and she enters

into a relationship with Devil Ann's son Johnson, they call him , Jonesy.

And she leaves her family to live with them because McCoy basically, Randall

McCoy basically disowns her when he finds out that she likes him, right?

He's so mad still.

This has festered for so long.

How could my daughter?

Yeah.

In, in the mini series, like Jonesy's, like, like the handsome Hatfield, he's

kind of a little bit of a playboy, right?

Yeah.

And they start this fling and they, you know, quote unquote fall in love.

Yeah.

You know?

And you have to think about it too, I, they, they don't get into

a bunch of this in the miniseries.

Jonesy already has a kid by another woman, there's not a lot

of people around at this time.

The people, you know, are your neighbors, because it's not

like you're going into the city.

It's not like you're meeting a bunch of people, right?

The hog trial was probably the event of the, of the year.

Well, and it's hard to travel around those hollers out there.

I mean, it's, travel is

It's slow.

You walk or you ride your horse.

So who else you going to see beside your neighbor?

And so there's very much like a Romeo and Juliet kind of situation,

because my enemy is the only person who has a son who's My age, you know,

so that's kind of what happens here.

When she tells Randall McCoy that she likes,

father.

yeah.

Then she tells Fann McCoy

she tells her

that she likes the Hatfield son.

He kicks her out.

So she goes over to them.

They take her in as good people.

They, But then she ends up getting pregnant and so then they kick her out

because it's starting a problem that they're not married and and so then the

McCoy's don't want her coming back with a basically a Bastard child so she's

kind of sent to live with an aunt on the outskirts of this whole area and

What's very weird is that The brothers, then, again, the McCoy brothers, try to

honor their sister and kidnap Johnsy.

And

and they, they were gonna kill

they were going to kill him.

And so she finds out about this and goes and tells the Hatfields.

The only people that she knows that can save him would be his own people,

even though she's kind of like

betraying her own

betraying her own brothers.

So she goes and tells the Hatfields.

The Hatfields go stop the killing.

And And they don't, they don't hurt the McCoy boys, but they, they

basically give a good, like this is your last chance kind of thing.

Like no one was hit, killed here, but this we're, we're escalating this.

This is getting really big and we need to stop.

And so John Z basically abandons her pregnant because

it is getting kind of big.

when neither side wants, it's either supports or condones

this relationship and they're ostracizing each of them.

So, it's kind of, it's not even a lesser of any evil.

Jonesy just kind of sides with his family and he leaves Roseanne and leaves her to

kind of fend for herself with her aunt.

Yeah, with her aunt.

And then he, typical guy who's just running around, marries Nancy McCoy.

So he does marry a McCoy.

It's a cousin of Rosanna, who happens to be the daughter of Asa McCoy,

From the very beginning.

Yeah, crazy.

right?

So it's like, like, so when you start to find these locations,

they are very close together.

And you're like, Okay, I can see how this is getting complicated.

Now, we're still at one death for one death, but we're starting

to get more complicated now.

A baby's brought into the picture.

Um, John Z did marry a McCoy, right?

So,

what's the next thing that kind of takes it to the next level?

so we're back at the cabin, the hog trial cabin, . It's

election day in Kentucky.

Everyone's coming out 1882.

This is almost almost 20 years after the end of the Civil

Yep, yeah, 20 years after the Civil War.

Again a gathering everyone comes back to the hog trial cabin because

it's the justice of the peace

and it's kind of in that area.

It's it's Central ish.

ish and it's where the elections being held where the boxes, right?

You write on your ballot and you put in the box only men can vote.

This is still only the men, right?

so the women are there like yeah, I'll make a pie and My man will vote, you know

it's a big event.

It's a bigger bet so Jonesy has a, has a still,

which a lot of the people did.

This is Kentucky.

This is 1880 until a moonshine and start get start drinking.

And the younger brothers of Rosanna are still pissed about everything that

happened with Johnsy and their sister.

She's since had the baby and they start messing around and pushing around.

Aunt's brother, his big brother, or actually no, his little brother, but a

brother who he really loved, Ellison.

Ellison Hatfield has a son named Cotton.

Ellison is a good guy.

He's trying to stop the escalation of these brothers.

They're getting mad at John Z.

Ellison's kind of like, leave him alone.

comes in to basically break up the

Break up the fight and Tolbert Farmer and bud the three

younger brothers of Rosanna the McCoys kill Ellison Not right away.

They stab him 26 times and shoot him.

I mean they they he doesn't die right away And cuz so initially

Anse Hatfield arrest them.

And he says, if my brother dies, I'm going to kill you

And so he so he actually has them and he arrests him like it's not

like he doesn't take him to the county jail Like he's holding them on his land.

his land.

He basically is like a group of vigilantes and he, he won't

let them be taken to Pikeville.

And the McCoy family tries, Randall McCoy tries to get them

taken to Pikeville to stand trial.

He's trying to get them.

legally to Pikeville, which as you see is probably about 20 minutes away.

for us

Yes, but imagine in a wagon or something.

But, um, the brothers are taken by force by anse and they're held up.

And then when Ellison dies, all three of the brothers are killed by the Hatfields.

They're tied to these pawpaw trees and shot numerous times.

A total of 50 shots were and their bodies were burned.

bullet riddled.

And soon, um, you can go to those pawpaw trees.

They are close.

We didn't go there.

It's one place we didn't go.

You can walk over to them.

That's where that Hadfield guy was saying he owns the land.

He owns that land, which, but you can go visit there if you want to.

It's pretty close to the , hog trial cabin.

And you can just basically walk out into the clearing and you can see where

they were tied to the trees and shot.

Yeah, so now Now things are, are just kind of out of control.

Now things are out of control because these three, they killed Ellison.

Then the Hatfields come back, take these three.

They, they kill these three.

I mean, just line them up and shoot them.

And now things, now things are out of control.

This is when Randall McCoy, I mean, of course, he's going to be so upset.

His sons were killed.

Three of his sons, like the oldest are all killed.

So he tries to get a lawyer, Perry Klein.

So you're going to hear Perry Klein's name a couple of times as well to arrest

the Hatfields for basically , acting as vigilantes and killing his sons.

And even though people.

in the area believe this revenge is warranted, right?

There's about 20 people who are indicted, including anse on this,

but, um, all of the Hatfields elude arrest that also angers McCoy

because no one can prove anything.

No one's going to testify against each other.

Right.

And so McCoy gets even more upset about all of

So is this when he calls in, the gun for hire?

And so also talk a little bit about the graves of those three

sons before we get any further.

Across from the well of the Hatfield house, across from the

well from the McCoy house, the three Hatfield boys were buried.

And there's a marker when you park into the parking lot to walk over to the McCoy

well where the cabin was, it'll say McCoy.

Cemetery.

It's not in the right location cause you can't go visit the

It's not

It's not public.

Why?

Because a Hatfield owns the land now where the McCoy boys are buried.

And because a Hatfield owns the land, they don't want people to go and visit it.

I mean, we laugh that the feud today is no longer going on, but in some regard it is.

Now, is that the one that a judge ruled that at least once a year

Family can

family can go and visit the

yes.

So when you talk to the well.

Yes, the McCoy family, once a year, is allowed to go onto the land and

visit the graves of the three boys.

But the public, you and I, couldn't go there and visit their graves.

So that's one place you can't

Yeah, it's private land.

Yeah.

And again, that is a big part of the story.

So but you can't go there.

McCoy feels like he can't get justice, and Perry Kline, the lawyer, who at

some point tried to sue Hatfield for his land, but was caught in some kind of

Doing it sketchy or

Yeah, it wasn't right.

He was, he was doing something that wasn't, it was definitely

fraud and Hatfield caught him.

So Perry Kline was kind of upset that he was caught in his wrongdoings.

They, they hire a man to come in and basically catch Hatfield

Yeah, isn't this

Bad Frank Phillips.

Frank Phillips is brought in.

You're going to get McCoys and Hatfields who are basically trying

to tie up loose ends and cover their stories and cover their tracks.

Hatfields kind of goes into hiding on his land, won't let anybody on his land

that he doesn't know, very afraid of what repercussions could happen to him.

Well, and part of it, if I remember from the miniseries, and you

were saying that it was pretty accurate, but Bad Frank Phillips is hired by

the McCoys to kind of go in there.

I think in the miniseries, they say, Hey, go and arrest them and bring them over

to this side so they can stand trial.

But they've, Hatfields have it so locked up on their property

that they can't go over.

And bad Frank Phillips, again in the miniseries, had this reputation of

being a little bit of a, of a wild, you know, wild kind of gun for hire.

And rather than trying to arrest, he just, you know, ended up starting

to, you know, Kill some people.

he, he started to kill cousins of the Hatfields that

made Anne's Hatfield more mad.

I would say Anderson Hatfield, old Anne's Hatfield, understood the predicament

he was in and maybe didn't agree that what he was doing was orthodox, but

once his family members start to get killed, he feels like he has to be

the one to rectify the situation.

And it deserves his, it deserves someone else to be killed for a family member

has been killed, even if he wasn't in the

Yeah, you could tell that Kevin Costner's character,

who's Devil Anse right?

Devil Anse Hatfield Was was torn.

He did a good job of portraying the hey, this needs to de escalate But ultimately

is just pushed across the line to defend his family rather than take the high road,

be able to take the high road and bring things, you know, back down to normalcy.

And so they really play that up.

And eventually even him, Devil Anse Hatfield, you know, Kevin Costner's

character is just like, okay, that's it.

We're done.

Like this is, this is us versus you.

And I am on the Hatfield side.

Kind of no matter

Yes.

So it's at this point that the, that the Hatfields.

Are so sick and tired of being afraid that they fight back and It reaches the I

would say the feud reaches its peak here.

And this is why the McCoy cabin no longer exists This is 1888.

It's New Year's Eve and Vance and crazy uncle with cotton who's Ellison's son

and he in the show.

He has the name cotton because he's most likely

He's simple

Yeah, simple minded right and so and I think that's even true true to

yeah, they treat him like cotton.

but but again loved within within the Hatfield

and they, slow, his mental capacity is, is diminished, and so they, The

Hatfields surround the McCoy cabin.

So it's Sarah and Randall with all their children so boys and girls and cotton gum.

Earnest Socializing.

is told to go around back.

And if anyone tries to leave from the back, shoot them.

Right, so they're coming for him and his wife.

You know, and they're standing outside the cabin yelling for him to come

out and she says don't she sends him out the back and he escapes before

cotton gets there and he had run off and then she starts sending the the

daughters that the girls out and that's when cotton kind of shoots one of the

So her idea is if they don't think you're home,

they'll leave us alone, right?

So if you run, cause if you go out there, they're just going to kill you.

So if you run and pretend like you're not here, they'll leave us alone.

Well, they don't leave them alone.

They end up killing two of the boys and they beat Sarah, almost killing her.

by Vance and Johnsy.

and then they burn the cabin

Then they burn the cabin down.

And like I said, one of the daughters is killed.

So the remaining McCoys will move to Pikeville

like in the city.

the city.

And that McCoy house is there.

Yeah, it's like a restaurant

a restaurant now.

So we visit there.

So like I said, there are things you're going to want to see in

Pikeville, that McCoy house.

This is after the fire of 1888 is where they move and live.

They spend the rest of their lives there in Pikeville.

That's the thing you're going to want to see in the city.

So after that, Cotton is going to be arrested and stand trial for the murder.

And he's found guilty and he's hanged in the square of Pikeville.

So that's another place you can visit in the city of Pikeville.

not like he was taken at night and, and hanged.

He was like, this was a public execution.

public execution, Ellison Cotton Topmounce was executed by hanging

and buried in an unmarked grave.

And if I remember correctly, this is kind of the thing that finally.

it, you know, at least as far as the events go, is everybody's out

there from both sides of the family, as well as the rest of the public.

And he's hanged.

And then that, that kind of takes the wind out of the sails of both

sides, because everybody, at least again, in the miniseries, kind of sees

like, okay, This can't continue on.

The two McCoy's that are killed are a son and the daughter.

And so it's on August 24th, 1888, that eight of the Hatfields

and their friends are indicted for the murder of the daughter.

Attafair, she was killed during the massacre and those included

Cap, John Z, Robert, and Elliot Hatfield, Ellison Mounts, Frank Ellis,

Charles Gipsy, and Thomas Chambers.

But only cotton.

is executed.

The rest of them will spend life in prison.

Um, those sent to prison, Valentine Hatfield, elder brother of Anne's Doc

Madden, son in law of the Hatfield and another son in law, 14 years in prison.

So this is basically the end.

This is where, again, after Cotton is hanged, the feud dies out.

Also, they believe because the McCoys moved to Pikeville, and

they're far enough away from the Hatfields, that this feud dies out.

There's, after this, there's no real Back and forth the fighting between the family

ceased after the hanging but the trials continue until 1901, trial of John Z,

sentenced to life imprisonment for his involvement in the New Year massacre.

So John Z will have life in prison.

And so then you get like, The modern era in 1979, family feud had the Hatfields

and the McCoys on the family feud.

Yeah, they did like it was a cash prize and a pig kept on

stage during the game, right?

And the Hatfield family won more money than the McCoys.

Now, I think you said it in the video, it was the early 2000s,

eventually both families kind of came together and signed something that

said, Hey, this, this feud is done.

Yeah, so they did a joint family reunion in 2000.

It garnered national attention, 5, 000 people attended, and that's

when They basically signed a truce.

Yeah.

I mean, kind of, it was ceremonial, but it actually, it, it meant something.

meant something.

I mean, we still have the issue with the graveyard, right?

That happened in 2002, a lawsuit about that graveyard, um, which is when

just they can be visited once a year.

Um, but there is basically, pretty much a truce between the families now.

And now they do like a big Hatfield McCoy festival.

It's a three day weekend in June, people come and visit.

Other things you can go and see that we went and see is you

definitely want to see the graves.

So in the city of Pikeville, you want to go see the McCoy graves.

You can see Randall, Sarah and Rosanna.

that was near like a fire station,

Yes, you have to park across the street, cross the street, and it's a

walk, so it's definitely not somebody who is in a wheelchair or can't do stairs.

not accessible.

It's not handicapped

It's basically straight up with a bunch of stairs and, but it's neat to see.

They're graves there.

You can also visit the Hatfield graveyard.

That's farther out.

Old roads.

We didn't go all the way out to that.

We went to a park that kind of told the stories of the Hatfields McCoys.

was, it was very neat.

And I encourage folks listening to this.

If you, if you like this story, , the video actually did pretty well for us.

It's a good video.

We took some time to make it and we show all these locations.

We show some maps so you get a feel for where in Virginia and West

Virginia, Kentucky area that, that we're at, as well as this kind of

memorial, , to both sides of the family.

Yeah.

And in case you were wondering Rosanna's baby.

doesn't make it past one year old.

She dies.

She has a little girl.

So you can also visit Aunt Betty's house and Rosanna's baby's grave site.

That's in Goody, Kentucky.

All of these locations are on the driving tour.

So when you when you see the driving tour, you can see how out in the middle

of Kentucky, West Virginia, you are.

And again, you're not going to have great cell phone coverage.

So again, I remind you to please download the locations beforehand

or take the map with you.

Perry Kline's grave site is available to you if you want to see that as well.

And the cotton top hanging site.

Again, you can go to the Paw Paw Trees.

And then, last but not least, you can go to Devil Hatfield's

monument at his gravesite.

There's a statue of him there, so you can go and visit that as well.

There's some other places off the beaten path, you know, Bad Frank Phillips.

His grave is out there.

He ends up marrying Nancy, who was married to Johnsy.

Yeah, he did that dude in the show

Yeah.

And he was, again, the daughter of the very first person who was killed.

So I talk about this like this was very much as you, as you start to visit these

sites and go to these locations, they're not far away from each other enough that

you can see how these families are so intertwined and this feud is long term.

But what has happened with these two names is they're synonymous

now with any kind of feud,

any sort of family feud.

any family feud, any feud between two people that maybe were

close at one time and now are not.

Maybe a few that's lasted a couple years.

Maybe a feud that is deeply ingrained in you when you're like, I hate him.

Like the Hatfield McCoy, like something that is deeply seated in you.

It's used in that vernacular.

Now it's become a part of our American psyche, this Hatfield and McCoy feud.

So it was really neat to go out there and to visit and to see it,

to understand it better, to kind of give these people more agency and to

understand their lives a little bit more.

But I was really honored to go there to talk to the people.

And like I said,,

the feud is not a hateful thing anymore.

Everybody talks about it pretty much with a smile on their face.

They're very open.

They talk about everything and openly and happily.

So it really is now just a, if you're coming to ask about it, you're

considered kin, you're considered part of America because it's something

that it belongs to all of us now.

It's all of our

Yeah, even though there are those with the name still today,

it's, it's more local legend than it really is anything else.

well, that's all the time we have for this episode.

Episode on the Hatfield McCoy feud.

A bloody mess, wasn't it?

Lives lost, families fractured, all over what started as a squabble over a pig.

Hard to believe, ain't it?

The feud finally sputtered out and around the turn of the century, but

its echoes still linger in these hills.

Sure, the Hatfields and McCoys ain't shootin each other anymore,

but there's a wariness, a distance that time hasn't opened.

Some folks say it's a cautionary tale, a reminder of how easily

a spark can turn into a bonfire.

Others say it's a testament to the stubborn pride that runs

deep in these Appalachian veins.

Maybe it's both.

Whatever the case, the Hatfield McCoy feud is a story that's woven

into the fabric of this place.

A story of violence, yes, but also of resilience.

Of families clinging to their own versions of the truth.

It's a reminder of the dark side of human nature.

But also the enduring strength of the human spirit Thank you for

listening to the talk with history podcast and please reach out to

us at our website talkwithhistory.

com But more importantly if you know someone else that might enjoy this

podcast, especially this episode on Hatfields McCoy's Shoot him a text

and tell him to look us up We rely on you our community to grow and

we appreciate you all every day.

We'll talk to you next time

Thank you.