Munsey's Magazine, November 1903

MUNSEY'S MAGAZINE, November 1903 "The Land of Feuds," by Hartley Davis and Clifford Smyth, documents seven major Kentucky family feuds in the Appalachian Mountains, where approximately 250 murders have resulted in only two legal executions. The article examines specific conflicts: the Howard-Turner feud in Harlan County (1882), sparked by a card game, involving eight years of violence until Captain Wilse Howard was defeated and later hanged in Missouri; the Logan-Tolliver feud in Rowan County, initiated over an 1884 sheriff's election, which Daniel Boone Logan (a lawyer) resolved by organizing fifty armed men for systematic elimination of the Tollivers, resulting in no legal punishment; the French-Eversole feud in Perry County, stemming from merchant rivalry and lasting thirty murders; and the Turner family's internal conflict in Bell County over a jailer position. The article emphasizes the region's code: hospitality toward outsiders balanced against casual murder, murder-for-hire available for two dollars daily, and systematic preference for ambush over fair combat.