When the Hatfields and McCoys blasted back into the public consciousness with a wildly popular television miniseries last month, lots of people in the Bluegrass were left wondering: "Could I be related to a famous feuder?"
If you have roots in Pike County, the answer is likely "yes."
Both patriarchs of the feud, which ran from about 1865 to 1891, had large families: "Devil" Anse Hatfield of West Virginia had 13 children, and Randolph McCoy of Pike County, Kentucky had 16. Many of those went on to continue the mountain tradition of having large families. So, the family trees have many, many branches. Probably several thousand living people are descended from "Devil" Anse Hatfield or from Randolph McCoy. A few people may be descended from both.
Writing in the Kentucky.com web site, Mary Meehan offers some history of the people and of the area, then provides some interesting hints on how to find records to prove or disprove your descent from these feuding families. You can read her article at http://goo.gl/Hd9PS.
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