Hatfields & McCoys

KathyLu said:
My great grandfather, Larkin McCoy, was very active in the Hatfield/McCoy Feud and told his children he was the one who shot Jim Vance (Devil Anse Hatfield's uncle), the man who killed his dad, Asa Harmon McCoy because he had fought with the Union Army during the Civil War.

While Vance lay mortally wounded, Frank Phillips, Sheriff of Pike County, shot him in the head and used his brain to polish his boots. Larkin McCoy had 11 children (including my grandpa, Jacob) with his first wife, Mary Elizabeth Coleman McCoy, and no children from his two subsequent marriages.
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Hi KathyLu, I grew up on Peter Creek in the home of Frank Mccoy, also grandson to Asa Harmon Mccoy. My father purchased the home from Joe Mccoy, Frank's son, in the mid 70s. I was wondering if you or some of your family know if the home was first owned by Frank or was it passed down from Larkin or another family member? While I was googling last night I found a picture of my childhood home in a 1944 LIFE magazine article...I almost fell out of my chair! I am so pleased to see a picture of my beloved home from 1944. I would like to learn more if you have any info.
I think Asa is buried in the Dotson Cemetary? It is located a short distance up the creek in Boardtree. It's amazing to me that all this history took place in the same creek I played in an the same ground I played on. Im proud of my mountain heritage. I moved away when I was 18 to attend college. 24 years later I still live in Ky, about 2.5 hours from Phelps. My brother now owns my childhood homec
 
Anitaky, I spent a lot of time in that old house when I was a teenager. Frank and Merkie (America) lived there then. Are you talking about Joseph/Tiny McCoy or Joseph (Mix)McCoy who sold you the house? I have that original article from a 1944 issue of Life Magazine. I lived in Phelps, off and on, from 1998-2002 and still own property there.

I got an email from a Joe McCoy the other day. He had seen this thread on The Salem Spectator and contacted me through my website. We know a lot of the same people and we are third cousins.

If you like poetry, check out my website. I write quite often about my family and childhood in Kentucky.
 
Oh, my gosh, talk of small world, etc. Love reading all this.
 
CBS This morning (Charles Osgood) just had a whole big segment on the Hatfields & McCoys. Lots of old pictures (stills) plus video clips from a couple of movies, and the recent series. Interview with a McCoy descendant & his wife, but they had a different last name. At one point the elderly man laughed, and said something about laughing about the things "they don't know", meaning historians, reporters, etc. There was even a clip of a young Walter Kronkite reporting on the feud. They showed a clip of the marble statue Devil Anse had purchased and hauled up the mountain, to set in all it's glory. The relative's wife tjen asked her husband if they can laugh about what they DO know. He played guitar and sang a few bars of some song he wrote, but wasn't very good. LOL. They did go thru a very short version of the history with all the pics and stills.
Twas interesting. I hope some here saw it. Got to run now.
 
Anitaky, Frank McCoy built the house that stands on the property now. There was an older house located several yards behind it but it was torn down to build the current one. I don't know if Frank built the original house or not but that's something I will check on. His children are all gone now except for a daughter, who lives in Michigan. We are as close as sisters and I talk to her quite often.
 
I agree with everyone else. This thread rocks! It's amazing we have such history in here & I love the link to Life Magazine. I am so intrigued by history like this!
 
KathyLu said:
Anitaky, I spent a lot of time in that old house when I was a teenager. Frank and Merkie (America) lived there then. Are you talking about Joseph/Tiny McCoy or Joseph (Mix)McCoy who sold you the house? I have that original article from a 1944 issue of Life Magazine. I lived in Phelps, off and on, from 1998-2002 and still own property there.

I got an email from a Joe McCoy the other day. He had seen this thread on The Salem Spectator and contacted me through my website. We know a lot of the same people and we are third cousins.

If you like poetry, check out my website. I write quite often about my family and childhood in Kentucky.
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KathyLu, It was Tiny Mccoy who sold us the house. Do you remember the little fuzzy dog named Sugar? We got to keep the dog too when Dad bought the house! I also ordered the May 1944 issue of the Life magazine. One of the pics showed some women at a quilting bee in Frank's house. By the position of the double windows and the wall to the right, it was the room mom and dad used as their bedroom. We may know each other Kathy, I'm not sure. My parents moved out of Phelps in 1998 or 1999. Mom was a teacher at Phelps high, and dad was a coal miner.

As a young girl, my mother's mom always loved that house and wanted to live in it. Ironic that mom ended up raising her family there. A lot of time was spent in the woods behind the house, swinging from grapevines and climbing cliffs. There was a railroad track behind the house, apparently built after the 1944 pic because I didn't see it in the picture. We played in the woods behind the tracks. Also, there was and still is a road going up the hill to the left of the house and up and over the mountain. In the winter we risked life and limb riding gigantic caol truck tire inner tubes down that mountain road!! I don't think mom and dad knew all the mischief we got in to.

I will try to find some pics of the house when we lived in it and post them along with the 1944 pic. Sentimental history buffs will appreciate how much finding that old picture and the history of my house means to me. It is truly a treasure.

Anitaky
 
I agree with everyone that this is a great thread. It's a small world! I love history and love reading all of this.
 
I am such a geneology buff that it is like I cannot get enough of this. The thing is, while we all have ancestors, many who struggled to overcome so many hardships, it is rare to find among us, those who really "made history". I love all of this, and want to thank those descendants of the Hatfields and/or McCoys for all they can contribute. I love it all.

A question.....is there a "McCoy" or "Hatfield" special cemetery in the areas in which they lived? And...that marble statue of Devil Anse...have any of you seen it?
 
Many of our ancestors (including my parents) are buried in the Billie Dotson cemetery at Boardtree, KY. My brother, who lives in Logan, WV, goes there every year on Memorial Day. I haven't seen the Devil Anse headstone but have seen pictures of it. In the Life magazine article, the picture of Frank McCoy crossing the swinging bridge, shows his homeplace in the background. As I said before, I spent many happy times there. There were two huge pear trees in the front yard that produced wonderful pears. Frank was also well known for his chestnut tree orchard. He started the trees from sprigs and, when they were grown, people came from miles around to buy the chestnuts. I loved walking under the trees with Frank but occasionally got hit on the head by a falling chestnut burr.

Even after they got a bathroom installed, the old toilet still sat perched over the water in the branch: instant flushing. :) Frank kept bees and, when he used the toilet, he had to go through the bees. They never bothered him and he told me that was because he wasn't afraid of them. I started using his philosophy and, to this day, never show fear when a dasterdly stinging insect comes toward me. They leave me alone.

The following pictures show Frank and Merkie's house that Anita lived in. Merkie is on the right. She almost always had a quilting frame set up in the hugh living room that stretched the whole front of the house. She taught me how to quilt and we always had fun together even though she was so much older than I was. We used to go up the hollow to pick wild flowers, then we played that old pump organ for hours.

Quilting 1944.jpg Ada McCoy Wright 1964.jpg​
The second picture is Ada McCoy Wright in front of Frank and Merkie's house in 1964.

Sorry to be so wordy, y'all.....
 
Oh, gosh, Kathy, I love this. WAnt to laugh? I have an old pump organ.......says 1875, Brattlesboro, Vermont.
 
Frank McCoy, son of Larkin McCoy, eloped in the early 1900s with America Elizabeth Hatfield. As they were sneaking off the porch, Frank stumbled over a chicken and, naturally, it started squawking. Frank said he had visions of JP Hatfield coming at him with a shotgun but they made their getaway and were married almost 60 years before she died.
 
Thank you, KathyLu. I love all of the information that you're sharing with us. My Dad's family is originally from West Virginia, and spread into southwestern Pennsylvania and eastern Kentucky. My Dad would take me to visit the hollows when I was little. His history lessons were great, and some were about the feud. He always said that the Hatfields and McCoys were in trouble so much that his family got away with their moonshining and poaching most of the time.
 
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