Revisit the legend of the feud between the Hatfield and McCoy families
Learn more about the feud between the Hatfield and McCoy families.
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Transcript
The feud between the Hatfields and McCoys is the stuff of legend. Unfortunately, it also became the stuff of caricature.
The infamous dispute is one of the origins of the hillbilly stereotype that has plagued residents of rural Appalachia for a century or more. In reality, the battles between the Hatfields and the McCoys were fought as much in the courts as with bullets. Yet it’s often told as the tale of two wild clans of violent outlaws picking each other off over a stolen hog.
If you happen to be of Appalachian extraction, you may want to know how this insulting stereotype developed. The story begins with some yellow journalism — the fake news of a century past.
A journalist named T. C. Crawford did a series of articles on the Hatfields and McCoys, eventually released as the book An American Vendetta. This salacious, often exaggerated, story became a media sensation. It also depicted the families as violent, uncivilized warring clans — admittedly not too much of a stretch as the death toll mounted.
The thrilling, distorted narrative gripped the nation, but it wasn’t just about a good yarn. This version of the tale suited some powerful interests.
With timber, mining, and the railroads eager to extract wealth from Eastern Appalachia, the major capitalists of the time were gobbling up land occupied by families like the Hatfields and McCoys. And it’s these financial interests that benefited most from the legend of the feud.
The myth of rural people in Appalachia as uncivilized and violent was exactly the image that extractive industries wanted to project. Large corporations bought up land and mineral rights, often obscuring how much damage would be done to the land as a result. Then they made huge profits while destroying the way of life that people like the Hatfields and McCoys had relied on.
Corporate executives probably felt a lot better about themselves if they thought of the people whose land they were wrecking as violent barbarians desperately in need of modernization.
People in the region are still fighting those stereotypes today.
The infamous dispute is one of the origins of the hillbilly stereotype that has plagued residents of rural Appalachia for a century or more. In reality, the battles between the Hatfields and the McCoys were fought as much in the courts as with bullets. Yet it’s often told as the tale of two wild clans of violent outlaws picking each other off over a stolen hog.
If you happen to be of Appalachian extraction, you may want to know how this insulting stereotype developed. The story begins with some yellow journalism — the fake news of a century past.
A journalist named T. C. Crawford did a series of articles on the Hatfields and McCoys, eventually released as the book An American Vendetta. This salacious, often exaggerated, story became a media sensation. It also depicted the families as violent, uncivilized warring clans — admittedly not too much of a stretch as the death toll mounted.
The thrilling, distorted narrative gripped the nation, but it wasn’t just about a good yarn. This version of the tale suited some powerful interests.
With timber, mining, and the railroads eager to extract wealth from Eastern Appalachia, the major capitalists of the time were gobbling up land occupied by families like the Hatfields and McCoys. And it’s these financial interests that benefited most from the legend of the feud.
The myth of rural people in Appalachia as uncivilized and violent was exactly the image that extractive industries wanted to project. Large corporations bought up land and mineral rights, often obscuring how much damage would be done to the land as a result. Then they made huge profits while destroying the way of life that people like the Hatfields and McCoys had relied on.
Corporate executives probably felt a lot better about themselves if they thought of the people whose land they were wrecking as violent barbarians desperately in need of modernization.
People in the region are still fighting those stereotypes today.