In the late nineteenth century, the Hatfields of West Virginia and the McCoys of Kentucky engaged in a brutal feud that resulted in the deaths of members from both sides and sparked a legal dispute that wound up to the United States Supreme Court.
Nobody knows exactly how the feud began. It could have been tied to the Civil War, a razorback hog, or a tragic romance between two young lovers. It could have been all three, or something else lost to time. But whatever sparked the Hatfield and McCoy quarrel was enough to make it one of the most notorious fights in American history.
The conflict began in the late nineteenth century between two families, the Hatfields of West Virginia and the McCoys of Kentucky, who lived on opposing sides of a stream known as the Tug Fork. Regardless of how it began, their hatred was in full flow by the early 1880s, eventually leading to many brutal murders and even a Supreme Court lawsuit.
Today, “Hatfield and McCoys” refers to any two parties involved in a bitter dispute. But how did theirs emerge? What occurred during it? And when did it fade out?
This is the complete account of the Hatfield and McCoy conflict, from its mysterious origins to its enduring presence in American popular culture.
The Possible Civil War Origins Of The Hatfield-McCoy Feud
Though it’s unclear what sparked the Hatfield and McCoy rivalry, the earliest possible episode occurred in the 1860s, near the close of the bloody and bitter Civil War years.
At the time, the Hatfields and McCoys supported the Confederacy. However, McCoy family member Asa Harmon McCoy decided to fight for the Union and joined a volunteer militia known as the Pike County Home Guards. During the Civil War, these Union volunteers created enemies in McCoy area by launching guerilla operations.
William “Devil Anse” Hatfield, a member of the Logan Wildcats, promised revenge for the Union attacks. And Asa Harmon McCoy was an easy target. He’d returned home at the end of December 1864 after being treated in a Union hospital for a leg injury, and he resided only across Tug Fork from the Hatfields and their sympathizers.
The Logan Wildcats arrived on January 7, 1865, in search of Asa Harmon McCoy. They cornered him when he was getting water from his well and shot him to death, despite Asa’s attempts to flee to a nearby cave.
His murder was initially blamed on Devil Anse, but it could have been his uncle, Jim Vance. Whoever was guilty, Asa’s death was the first shot in the Hatfield-McCoy war. And ties between the two families on each side of the Tug Fork would quickly worsen.
The Hatfield-McCoy feud may have originated with a strange wartime murder. But it got deeper due of a razorback hog.
In 1878, 13 years after Asa’s death, his brother Randolph McCoy accused the Hatfields of taking his pig. As the Hatfield & McCoy Foundation notes, hogs were a valuable item in the impoverished region. Randolph stated that Floyd Hatfield, Devil Anse Hatfield’s cousin, had fled with the animal. Although the matter got to trial, it was presided over by Devil Anse’s cousin, “Preacher Anse” Hatfield.
Unsurprisingly, the Hatfields won the day. The lawsuit rested on the testimony of a guy named Bill Staton, a McCoy relative married to a Hatfield, who corroborated Floyd Hatfield’s account.
They finally got their retribution two years later. Staton was brutally murdered by Sam and Paris McCoy, Randolph McCoy’s nephews. Despite standing trial for murder, Sam McCoy was acquitted on the grounds that he murdered Staton in self-defense.
With that, the Hatfield-McCoy rivalry may have been ruled a tie. It could’ve ended there. But the plot took a turn when two star-crossed lovers entered the picture.
The Love Triangle at the Heart of the Hatfield-McCoy Feud
Shortly after the Hog Trial, Devil Anse Hatfield’s son Johnse crossed paths with Randolph McCoy’s daughter, Roseanna. They fell quickly and madly in love with one another.
But when Roseanna left to West Virginia to live with Johnse, the McCoys followed her.
Not only did the McCoys recover Roseanna, but they also arrested Johnse for bootlegging. The Hatfields couldn’t stand by and let this happen, so Devil Anse promptly formed his own posse to rescue Johnse.
All of this was awful enough, but it turned out Roseanna was pregnant. Neither family would allow the pair to be together, so Roseanna, who was unmarried, gave birth to a baby girl named Sarah Elizabeth McCoy. However, her family shunned both her and the baby. Sarah Elizabeth died of measles before her first birthday, and Roseanna died shortly after at the age of 29, allegedly from a broken heart.
However, Johnse Hatfield eventually married Nancy McCoy, Roseanna’s cousin and the daughter of Asa Harmon McCoy, who was assassinated by Confederate irregulars in 1865.
The failed love affair exacerbated animosity between the Hatfields and McCoys, yet only two people died: Roseanna and infant Sarah Elizabeth. However, the Hatfields and McCoys’ enmity would quickly escalate into violence.
The ‘New Year’s Massacre’ And the end of the conflict between the Hatfields and McCoys.
During an Election Day party in 1882, the Hatfield-McCoy feud turned violent. Three of Randolph McCoy’s kids began fighting with two of Devil Anse’s siblings. As the struggle progressed, one of the McCoys stabbed Ellison Hatfield two dozen times before shooting him in the back.
Preacher Anse Hatfield, famous for the Hog Trial, asked that the McCoys be taken to Pikeville jail immediately. When the three McCoy brothers took a break for dinner and a good night’s sleep, a furious Devil Anse pursued them with a Hatfield posse.
They chained the McCoy lads to a stand of pawpaw trees and opened fire. The three brothers, Tolbert, Pharmer, and Randolph McCoy Jr., were all killed in a shower of gunfire.
As the national media became aware of the developing family dispute in Appalachia, the Hatfields appeared to resolve the situation for good. In December 1888, they escalated the animosity by planning an attack on the home of the family patriarch, Randolph McCoy.
On January 1, 1888, a gang of Hatfield men commanded by Cap Hatfield and Jim Vance invaded Randolph McCoy’s house. Randolph managed to escape, but his son Calvin and daughter Alifair were killed, and his wife Sarah was horribly assaulted. Randolph’s home was also completely destroyed.
This terrible event, known as the New Year’s Massacre, marked the beginning of the end of the Hatfield and McCoy conflict.
The End of the Infamous Family Feud—and Its Impact On American Culture
Following the assault on Randolph McCoy’s home, the Hatfields and McCoys became too violent for the police to ignore. Vance was killed by a bounty hunter, and nine Hatfield family members were arrested.
When West Virginia fought for their release, claiming that they had been unjustly extradited, the case went all the way to the Supreme Court. That year, the court determined that the extradition had not been illegal. Seven men were sentenced to life in prison, and one was executed.
That effectively ended the Hatfield-McCoy feud. However, it quickly became a famous part of Appalachian mythology, and it is now recognized as the bloodiest family conflict in American history.
Indeed, the feud grew larger than itself in the twentieth century. The Hatfield-McCoy rivalry not only inspired numerous films, but it also found its way into popular culture in other ways. It allegedly inspired the game program Family Feud, for example, and the acerbic character Leonard “Bones” McCoy on Star Trek is supposed to be derived from the infamous family.
As so, the Hatfield-McCoy rivalry left an indelible effect on American history. Though it erupted in a remote corner of the country and lasted only a few years, the Hatfields and McCoys’ violence, drama, and sorrow have left a lasting impression.
