History

2022

January 2022

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Visit https://www.census.gov/history every month for the latest Census History Home Page!

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U.S. Census Bureau History: The Hatfield and McCoy Feud

Devil Anse Hatfield led his family through a violent, decades-long feud with the McCoy
family in nearby Pike County, KY.

Although popular culture stereotyped Hatfield as a bumbling "hillbilly," he was actually
a prosperous timber merchant who owned thousands of acres of land in Logan and
Mingo Counties, WV.

Image courtesy of the West Virginia State Museum.

The Hatfield and McCoy families lived along the Tug Fork of the Big Sandy River separating West Virginia and Kentucky. Violence between the two families began during the American Civil War and led to a bitter, decades-long rivalry that cost many family members and friends their lives. Although the feud informally ended in the 1890s, the families did not agree to a formal truce until 2003. Despite the passage of more than 150 years, the violent Hatfield and McCoy Feud remains one of the most legendary disagreements in American history.

When the American Civil War began in 1861, family patriarchs William "Devil Anse" Hatfield of West Virginia and Randolph McCoy of Kentucky sided with the Confederates and participated in a number of raids in the two border states between the Union North and Confederate South. Between 1863 and 1865, several Hatfield and McCoy family members and friends were killed or wounded during "war-related" actions that were rumored to have been tit-for-tat revenge attacks between the two families. By 1878, animosity between the Hatfields and McCoys had been simmering for more than a decade when Randolph McCoy accused Devil Anse Hatfield's cousin Floyd of stealing a hog. McCoy sought a legal resolution to the hog's ownership. Justice of the Peace Anderson Hatfield gathered a jury of six Hatfield and six McCoy family members to hear Randolph's case. After listening to evidence that included testimony from Bill Staton—a relative of both families—seven jury members (six from the Hatfield family and one from the McCoy family) sided with Floyd Hatfield. Randolph and the McCoy clan were furious. In June 1880, Randolph's brothers Paris and Sam McCoy killed Bill Staton claiming "self-defense."

Much to the chagrin of the McCoy family, Devil Anse Hatfield's son Johnson began courting Roseanna McCoy in the years after the hog trial. When the McCoys arrested Johnson for bootlegging in an attempt to end the relationship, a posse of Hatfields rode into Kentucky, surrounded the McCoy home, and demanded Johnson's release. Johnson left the pregnant Roseanna McCoy and later wed her cousin Nancy in 1881. The next year, Roseanna's brothers Tolbert, Pharmer, and Randolph "Bud" McCoy attacked Devil Anse's brother Ellison Hatfield, leaving him gravely wounded. The McCoy's were arrested, but intercepted by a Hatfield posse as law enforcement transported the trio to Pikeville, WV, for trial. When Ellison Hatfield died from his stab and gunshot wounds, the Hatfields tied the McCoy brothers to a paw paw tree and riddled them with bullets. Many in the region considered the murder of the McCoys a justifiable case of vigilante justice.

The feud grew increasingly violent following the "Paw Paw Tree Incident". When Jeff McCoy killed a mailman in 1886, constable Cap Hatfield and friend Tom Wallace gave chase, eventually shooting and killing McCoy. The following spring, Wallace was murdered. On January 1, 1888, Cap and Vance Hatfield led a group of family and friends into Kentucky and set Randolph McCoy's cabin afire. Waiting in ambush outside the home, Randolph McCoy escaped the melee but his wife Sarah was nearly beaten to death and two of their children were killed. Following the attack, Pike County, KY, Sheriff Frank Phillips organized a posse (that included Bud and Jim McCoy) to hunt down the Hatfields. After that posse killed Vance Hatfield and captured or killed several Hatfield allies, they cornered the remaining Hatfield massacre participants at Grapevine Creek on January 19, 1888. Following a brief standoff, eight men were arrested and indicted for the murder of one of Randolph McCoy's daughters during the New Year's Day violence, including Cap, Johnson, Robert, and Eliot Hatfield, Ellison Mounts, French Ellis, Charles Gillespie, and Thomas Chambers.

The Hatfields fought their supposed "illegal extradition" to Kentucky all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. On May 14, 1888, the court ruled in (Mahon v. Justice 127 U.S. 700 (1888)) that even though the Hatfields and their co-conspirators may have been forcibly returned from their asylum state (West Virginia) without the benefit of a lawful extradition procedure, no federal laws prevented them from being tried. Thereafter, between 1888 and 1901, all eight men were found guilty of the murder with seven receiving prison sentences. Ellison Mounts was executed on February 18, 1890.

The families announced a truce in 1891, but distrust between the Hatfields and McCoys continued for decades. The families sealed their truce with a handshake in 1976, but the two families were once again at odds in a property dispute in 2000. After a 3-year court battle, a judge decided the case so each family could claim a partial victory and hopefully avoid rekindling the feud. During a televised ceremony on June 14, 2003, the Hatfield and McCoy families signed a formal truce proclaiming that the families, "do hereby and formally declare an official end to all hostilities, implied, inferred and real, between the families, now and forevermore." Today, the Hatfields, McCoys, residents of the Tug Fork Valley, and curious tourists celebrate Appalachian culture and the newfound friendship between the formerly feuding families at the annual Hatfield McCoy Heritage Days and Moonshine Festival in Pikeville, KY.

You can learn more about the Hatfields, McCoys, and the region they called home using data and records collected by the U.S. Census Bureau's censuses and surveys. For example.

• The Hatfields and McCoys lived on opposite sides of Tug Fork—a tributary of the Big Sandy River—separating Kentucky and West Virginia. The Hatfields lived in Logan County, WV, and the McCoys lived in Pike County, KY. The feud grew most bitter and violent following the 1880 Census. In 1880, Logan County's population was 7,329, and Pike County had 13,001 residents. By 1890, Logan and Pike Counties had grown to 11,101 and 17,378, respectively. Thanks to its rich coal reserves, Logan County's population peaked in 1950 with 77,391 residents. An estimated 32,567 people called Logan County home in 2019. Like nearby Logan County, WV, the population of Pike County, KY, grew thanks to the massive deposits of coal mined from its mountains. Between 1900 and its peak in 1950, Pike County's population grew from 22,686 to 81,154. More recently, Pike County, KY, was home to 58,669 in 2019.
• In 1895, West Virginia divided Logan County to create Mingo County, WV. In 1900, Mingo County recorded 11,359 residents. Like neighboring Logan County, WV, and Pike County, KY, the county's population peaked at 47,409 in 1950—thanks to the region's abundant natural resources. In 2019, Mingo County had an estimated 23,568 residents.
• Animosity between the Hatfield and McCoy families began during the American Civil War, but erupted into an outright feud over the disputed ownership of a hog in 1878. The census of agriculture found that farms in the United States produced 47,081,100 swine in 1880, including 2,225,225 in the McCoy home state of Kentucky and 510,013 in the Hatfield's state of West Virginia. Ohio led the nation with more than 25 million produced in 1880. More recently, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported that on September 1, 2021, the nation's inventory of hogs and pigs was 75.4 million. Iowa farmers raised more hogs and pigs than any other state with 23.6 million. Minnesota and North Carolina were a distant second and third raising 8.7 million and 8.5 million, respectively.
• The Hatfields, McCoys, and many other Appalachian families were prolific "moonshiners," producing homemade liquor without paying taxes on the production to the government. Although it is unknown how much illegal moonshine was produced while the Hatfields and McCoys were feuding, the production of taxed alcohol rose from 72,600,000 gallons of distilled spirits and 6,600,000 gallons of fermented malt alcohol in 1870 to 109,000,000 gallons of distilled spirits (including industrial alcohol) in 1900 and 803,751,000 gallons by 1960.
• The idea that residents of the Appalachian region of the United States are poorly educated is an undeserved stereotype. In 2019, American Community Survey data estimated that 88 percent of the U.S. population 25 years and over was a high school graduate or higher, and 32.1 percent had a bachelor's degree or higher. In Kentucky, 86.3 percent of people 25 years and over had a high school diploma or higher and 24.2 percent had a bachelor's degree or higher. Of West Virginia's population 25 years and over, 86.9 percent had high school diplomas or higher and 20.6 percent had a bachelor's degree or higher. That same year, 77 percent of Pike County, KY's population 25 years and over had a high school diploma or higher and 13 percent had a bachelor's degree or higher. Among the same age group in West Virginia, 79.8 percent of Logan County's residents had a high school diploma and 10 percent had bachelor's degree or higher. In nearby Mingo County, WV, 75.5 percent were at least high school graduates and 9.9 percent had bachelor's degrees or higher.
• Popular representations of the Hatfields and McCoys in movies, television shows, and literature often depict the families as poor, bumbling "hillbillies." In realty, many Hatfield and McCoy family members were prosperous farmers, businessmen, and community leaders. For example, William "Devil Anse" Hatfield—patriarch of the Hatfield family—was a successful timber merchant in Logan County, WV. The Hatfields owned thousands of acres of land and employed scores of employees to cut and transport lumber from West Virginia's forests. Data from the 1880 Census shows many people living in the Appalachian region benefited from its wealth of natural resources. For example, 65,497 West Virginians reported they were farmers and planters; 41,767 were agricultural laborers; 212 identified as lumbermen, raftsmen, and woodchoppers; and 778 owned or worked in the state's sawmills. In 2020, the U.S. Department of Labor estimated that nationally, 45,500 people worked in the logging industry and 888,300 were farmers, ranchers, and other agricultural managers.
• The economies of West Virginia and Kentucky have changed considerably since the days of William "Devil Anse" Hatfield and Randolph McCoy. Data from the Census Bureau's County Business Patterns series for the pay period that included March 12, 2019, found that the employers leading West Virginia's economy included the Health Care and Social Assistance sector (NAICS 62) employing 132,802; the Retail Trade sector (NAICS 44–45) employing 80,482; and the Accommodations and Food Services sector (NAICS 72) with 69,024 employees. In Kentucky, the Health Care and Social Assistance sector led the state for the number of employees with 260,342, followed by the Manufacturing sector (NAICS 31–33) with 252,706, and the Retail Trade sector with 217,788 people employed.
• The Appalachian region of the United States is famous for more than just the feuding Hatfield and McCoy families. The region is the setting for the Academy Award Winning-movie Coal Miner's Daughter as well as the young adult novel and movie series The Hunger Games. Famous Appalachians include: explorer Daniel Boone; National Basketball Association All-Star Hal Greer; frontiersman and Texas Alamo defender Davy Crockett; President of the United States Abraham Lincoln; National Aeronautics and Space Administration mathematician Katherine Johnson; test pilot Chuck Yeager; former Secretary of State Cyrus Vance; Confederate General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson; singer Tennessee Ernie Ford; Welch, WV, comedian and game show host Steve Harvey; and Pittman Center, TN, singer and actor Dolly Parton.

The Hatfield and McCoy families of Kentucky and West Virginia were embroiled in a decades-long feud that killed or injured dozens of
the families' men, women, and young children. When the Hatfields posed for this family photo in 1899, eight family members and friends
had recently been convicted or were awaiting trial for the death of Randolph McCoy's young daughter in a January 1, 1888, attack that
left two children dead and their mother severely beaten.

A verbal truce announced in 1891 was affirmed with a handshake in 1976. In 2003, the families formally signed an agreement to end
hostilities. Today, Hatfields, McCoys, friends, neighbors, and tourists celebrate the families' history and Appalachian culture at the
annual Hatfield McCoy Heritage Days and Moonshine Festival in Pikeville, KY.

Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress.

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Did you know?

A January 10, 1921, fire at the U.S. Department of Commerce building in Washington, DC, destroyed most of the population schedules from the 1890 Census.

An investigation was inconclusive, but potential causes of the fire included careless disposal of a cigarette or match, faulty wiring, and the spontaneous combustion of sawdust in the building's workshop.

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Appalachia

For centuries, the Hatfield and McCoy families have lived in Logan and Mingo County, WV, and Pike County, KY, in a region of the United States known as Appalachia. Located along the Appalachian Mountains and stretching from New York to Alabama, the cultural center of Appalachia lies among the Blue Ridge and Great Smoky Mountains of Kentucky, West Virginia, Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee.

Although the region's forestry-, hardscrabble farming-, and mining-dominated economy has ebbed and flowed over the decades, the Appalachian population has remained one of the poorest in the nation. According to 2019 Small Area Income and Poverty Estimate (SAIPE) data, 12.3 percent of the total population of the United States lives in poverty, but 16.2 percent of West Virginia's population lives in poverty, while 16 percent of Kentucky's population lives in poverty.

Hardest hit counties in the Hatfield's home state of West Virginia include: McDowell County (33.8 percent); Mingo County (27.3 percent); and Gilmer County (25.5 percent). The percentage of Logan County, WV, residents living in poverty in 2019 was 21.9 percent.

In the McCoy's home state of Kentucky, 35.5 percent of Owsley County lived in poverty, followed by Lee County (34.9 percent), McCreary County (34.5 percent), and Martin County (34.4 percent. An estimated 24 percent of the population of Pike County, KY, lived in poverty.

Photo courtesy of the U.S. Geological Survey.

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For the Record

The feud between the Hatfields and McCoys may be one of the most famous grudges in American history, but it is not the only one to make headlines. The award-winning musical Hamilton features the feud between former U.S. Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton and Vice President of the United States Aaron Burr that ended with Hamilton's dueling death on July 11, 1804, in Weehawken, NJ.

Direct electrical current proponent Thomas Edison and alternating current supporter George Westinghouse argued over the superiority of their rival electricity delivery methods in the late 1800s. Their "War of the Currents" included gruesome displays of electricity's power. Their feud ended after Westinghouse won bids to supply power to the 1893 Chicago World's Fair and install his alternating current generators at the Niagara Falls power plant in 1895.

Chicago, IL, bootlegger Al Capone's rivals included Dean "Dion" O'Banion and federal prohibition agent Elliot Ness who helped send the mobster to prison in 1931.

The feud between movie stars Joan Crawford and Bette Davis was more than just an act. The two quarreled over love interests, movie roles, awards, and even wardrobes.

Last but not least, TV Guide Magazine named the cartoon character Wile E. Coyote (created by Chuck Jones and Michael Maltese) to its 2013 list of "Nastiest Villains of All Time" due to his feud with the Road Runner in animated shorts and feature-length movies.

Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress.

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Visit https://www.census.gov/history every month for the latest Census History Home Page!