Tag Archives: Harmon McCoy

Ran’l McCoy’s Final Months (1914)

02 Monday Oct 2023

Posted by in Cemeteries, Civil War, Hatfield-McCoy Feud, Pikeville

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Oral history relating to Randolph “Ran’l” McCoy’s final years is scant. Most historians rely upon Truda Williams McCoy’s book The McCoys: Their Story (1976) for information about his life. Here are a few news items which may in some part be reliable that provides more information about Ran’l and his final months of life.

Randolph McCoy Falls into Fireplace (January 10, 1914)

“Randall McCoy, who was a leader in the McCoy-Hatfield feud, at Pikeville, Ky., thirty years ago, fell into an open fireplace yesterday [Jan. 9] and before he could be removed he was fatally burned.”

Norwich (CT) Bulletin, 10 January 1914; “Aged Feudist Dies,” Dakota Farmers’ Leader (Canton, SD), 16 January 1914. The Leader says, “McCoy was 86 years old.”

Randolph McCoy Falls into Fireplace (January 16, 1914)

“Uncle Randall McCoy, an aged man, fell backward into the fire at the home of his grandson, Melvin McCoy, on Herald’s Branch last Friday morning [Jan. 9], and before help could reach him he was badly burned. On account of his enfeebled condition he was unable to remove himself from the flames.”

“Aged Man Burns,” Big Sandy News (Louisa, KY), 16 January 1914

Randolph McCoy Died (March 28, 1914)

Randolph McCoy died on March 28, 1914. Thomas Dotson, who was born and raised among feudists on Blackberry Creek, writes that he did not know anyone who attended Ran’l’s funeral, adding that Elias M. Hatfield knew the correct location of his grave. Ran’l’s grave remained marked with a rock for numerous decades after his death.

Thomas Dotson, The Missing McCoys, p. 28.

Randolph McCoy Obituary (March 31, 1914)

“Pikeville, Ky., March 31.—This village ‘turned out’ today to pay a tribute to Randolph McCoy, the famous feud leader, who lies dead at his home on Blackberry Creek. He was burned last fall and never recovered from the accident. ‘Ran’ McCoy, a generation ago, was a leader in the Hatfield-McCoy feud that kept the hill clans in Breathitt county, Ky., in turmoil for a dozen years. The trouble began in the early sixties, when James Vance, a marriage relative of ‘Bad Anse’ Hatfield shot and killed Harmon McCoy, a brother of ‘Ran.’ The feud was revived when one of ‘Bad Anse’s’ sons, Johnson Hatfield, eloped with one of ‘Ran’ McCoy’s daughters. ‘Ran’ said in 1907, at his mountain home in Blackberry Creek, near Pikeville, that he was ninety-six, that three of his children had been killed in the feud, two of them in 1887, and that he had killed six of his enemies, in different combats. It was estimated at that time that forty persons had been killed and more than 100 injured in the forty years that the two clans had been at war. ‘Things aren’t what they used to be,’ he said, as he greeted several of his old Hatfield foes at his birthday celebration. ‘Think of a Hatfield coming up to my front door, unarmed, walking straight in, and me a-shaking hands with him. I remember the time when I’d have got him a quarter of a mile away, or he’d have got me.’ ‘Ran’ McCoy, in 1897, led a sheriff’s posse into the Tug river wilds in search of ‘Cap.’ Hatfield who had chopped his way out of the county jail with an axe, but Hatfield got away from the posse. ‘Ran’ was shot twice, at different times, but he bore what the mountaineers called a ‘charmed life.’ One of his daughters went crazy after her brother and sister were killed in 1887.”

“Feudist Dies Natural Death: He Kept Kentucky Hill Clans in Turmoil for Years—Notorious Outlaw Lived 103 Years,” The Union (SC) Times, 3 April 1914.

Randolph McCoy Obituary (April 3, 1914)

“Uncle Randall McCoy, one of the oldest citizens of Pike county, and a participant and leader in the Hatfield-McCoy feud which brought a reign of terror to Eastern Kentucky thirty years ago, died at the home of his grandson, Melvin McCoy, on Herald’s branch, last Saturday morning from the effects of injuries he received by falling backward into an open fire place last autumn. Funeral and interment were held Sunday afternoon at the Dils cemetery across the river. At his death Mr. McCoy was 89, and he was a conspicuous figure in the most noted feud in the history of Kentucky. On New Year’s night, twenty-seven years ago, the Hatfields made an attack on his home, and in a bloody battle one of his daughters and two sons were killed. His home was also burned to the ground. But he pursued his enemies with relentless courage, and after depleting their rank he drove the remainder of them either from the state or into hiding. At the close of the bloody war he removed with his family to Pikeville, and lived here until the time of his death.”

“Randall McCoy Died at 89,” Big Sandy News (Louisa, KY), 3 April 1914

Randolph McCoy Obituary (April 3, 1914)

“Pikeville, Ky.—Randall McCoy, nonagenarian and leader in the famous McCoy-Hatfield feud, died Saturday at the home of his grandson here of burns received last fall. Twenty-seven years ago Randall McCoy’s home was burned New Year’s night and one daughter and two sons killed by the Hatfield clan. He lost two brothers in a subsequent fight, but pursued the feud so relentlessly that he eventually forced his enemies into hiding or out of the state.”

“Noted Feudist Leader Passes,” Montpelier (ID) Examiner, 3 April 1914.

Randolph McCoy Obituary (April 3, 1914)

“Randolph McCoy, nonagenarian and leader in the famous McCoy-Hatfield feud, died at the home of his grandson at Pikeville, Ky., of burns received last fall.”

The Ely (MN) Miner, 3 April 1914; Audubon (IA) Republican, 9 April 1914; The Kadoka (SD) Press, 10 April 1914.

NOTE: This post will be edited and expanded as time permits.

Interview of Dr. Leonard Roberts, Part 2 (Summer 1982)

28 Thursday Sep 2023

Posted by in Big Sandy Valley, Civil War, Hatfield-McCoy Feud

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Truda Williams McCoy’s The McCoys: Their Story (1976) is a classic book about the Hatfield-McCoy Feud. Truda, a McCoy descendant born in 1902 who married a grandson of Ran’l McCoy, collected her stories directly from feud participants and close family members prior to and during the 1930s. Truda was unable to publish her manuscript, but after her death in 1974 Dr. Leonard W. Roberts located and edited the manuscript, then published it through Preservation Council Press. In this 1982 interview, Dr. Roberts recollects the story of Squirrel Huntin’ Sam McCoy and contemplates bigger questions about the feud:

Did Squirrel Huntin’ Sam McCoy ever kill anyone?

He doesn’t say that he did in his manuscript. He says that he protected people. Now outside of the manuscript, he tells a story to his grandson who was visiting that “Yes, I did kill a man. It’s not in my manuscript. I just skipped it. I didn’t like to have it in there.” Or something like that. But when he and his brother Paris were out hunting they ran into one of the Ellison [Bill Staton] boys—I can’t think of the name right quick—ran into one of the boys that was on the other side most of the time. And this boy began to shoot and pretty soon he and Paris had been shot through and had fallen to the ground and—what was his name—Ellison [Bill Staton] was on top and was trying to twist this fellow’s head off or something like that and Squirrel Huntin’ Sam said, “I saw then I just had to shoot.” And he got up and shot and killed him. But then in telling this story, he said, “The reason I don’t tell this story much, I dread that it happened.” And you ask him why and he’d say, “Well, when we went up there to him, my enemy’s gun was already empty.”

Why did this feud get such nationwide attention?

Well, about three or four things there that maybe I can’t think of… One at a time. Let’s start out with the, let’s say problems with the Civil War. It’s a long story, but one of Randolph McCoy’s brothers had gone into the army on the Union side in the State of Kentucky. Went and fought in Kentucky down around Lexington and central Kentucky. Got discharged. Come back home. By that time the rebels had been organizing posses and groups to patrol the whole situation. So they’d heard that Harmon—this was the person’s name—had come back home. Been out fighting for the Union. Now he’s come back home. So they traced him down. And it seems that he stayed with his family only one night after two years in the war until he was shot at. Nobody could go out and get wood or water. Why, they’d be shot at. So he slipped out after midnight and went to the little cave back on the hillside. Well, by then, by the time he escaped it had been snowing a bit. So this posse who had come after him traced him in the snow and found him back in that cave, dragged him out, and killed him. The war was going on then. And everybody was away from home fighting on one side the other. And that sort of didn’t take hold, didn’t cause any hard feelings, until they all came back. And then it was understood that Harmon’s—he had four sons and two daughters—the four sons seem to have sworn that they would avenge their father’s murder now or sometime else. So they started to look for the enemy and continued looking for almost twenty years almost before it broke out into fighting.

How does this feud compare to the other feuds?

When you read about… Now we’re beginning to study Appalachia really in some depth and we find out that there were probably two hundred small or large blood feuds that happened before the war, you know, fighting over which ones are going and why you’re going, during the war when the posses and the bushwhackers began to come in, and then as soon as it settled down and the South was whipped, we might say, or worsted, and they came back, those soldiers came back and began to try and establish their names, the first thing they’d try to do is run for office and then they would hear sharp criticism about what they did and how they fought for the enemy and how they were beaten and so forth. And so the feuds began to erupt soon after the Civil War all up and down the Mississippi, Ohio, and up and down the mountains and rivers and so forth of the middle area. See, we’re talking about the buffer area here. When the Civil War was going on was between Kentucky, Arkansas, Tennessee, those are buffer states that goes between North and South.