wise his name became public and in the course of time his whereabouts became known back in Kentucky. Jeff McCoy’s brothers offered a reward for his capture and two men started upon the trail of the much desired fugitive. Within a short time they returned to Kentucky and claimed the reward. Where was the prisoner? The answer was given by the exhibition of a bloody lock of hair—the reward was paid.

Came the year 1887. Still not one of the twenty-three murderers of the three McCoy brothers had been apprehended, although they were frequently seen on the Kentucky side. Attempts to take them had been made from time to time, but the officers always found them in such numbers and so perfectly armed that an attempt to force their arrest would have resulted in much bloodshed without accomplishing the arrest.

Then Governor Proctor Knott of Kentucky took a hand and offered tempting rewards. His successor, General Simon Bolivar Buckner, renewed them, and issued requisitions for the twenty-three murderers upon the governor of West Virginia, appointing as agent one Frank Phillips to receive the prisoners.

Weeks passed and no attempt was made on the part of the West Virginia officers to execute the warrants for these men so badly wanted in Kentucky, and, to the utter surprise and indignation of Governor Buckner, the West Virginia Executive, Governor Wilson, refused to honor the requisitions, assigning various reasons and excuses for his non-action.

Governor Buckner, the old “warhorse,” as his friends and comrades-in-arms in the Civil War affectionately dubbed him, took the West Virginia governor to task for his lack of coöperation in the apprehension of the murderers. An exceedingly salty correspondence followed. The controversy grew so bitter that, for a time, a declaration of war between the two States would have surprised no one. And while the governors fought each other on paper, the murder mill ground on uninterrupted, the bloody warfare continued without molestation.

Now enters upon the scene Frank Phillips, Governor Buckner’s Kentucky agent, to receive the persons named in the requisition upon the Governor of West Virginia. He was a deputy sheriff. Though of slight stature, he was as brave a little man as ever trod the soil of Kentucky, so noted for her brave sons. He was rapid as lightning, and would have made an ideal quarterback for any college football team. With all his bravery he was cautious, circumspect and shrewd. A terror to evil-doers, he was the general favorite throughout Pike County among the law-abiding citizens.

An incident which occurred during the summer of 1887, illustrates the utter fearlessness of the little, keen-eyed deputy sheriff. Warrants for the murderers of the three McCoy brothers had been issued upon the indictments repeatedly and as often returned by the sheriff “not found,” notwithstanding the presence of the fugitives on the Kentucky side on various occasions was common knowledge. Having so long remained unmolested, the Hatfields grew bold, and in 1887, took great interest in the Pike County election. Such was their contempt of the officers that as election day approached, the sheriff of Pike County was notified to instruct his deputies, that had warrants against them, to be certain and stay away from the voting precinct at which they, the Hatfields, would appear on election days, or, if the officers should attend, to leave the bench warrants for their arrest behind.

The election following the appointment of Frank Phillips as a deputy was one of deep interest to the Hatfields. Desiring to attend it, they sent word to Phillips to remain away, or to come unarmed and without warrants. He was threatened with sure death if he violated these injunctions. Frank, however, was cast in a different mold from that of his predecessors. He replied, in writing, that business demanded his presence at that election precinct on election day; that he would be there; that he would bring along the bench warrants, would come fully armed and that he intended to either take or kill them.

The Hatfields were amazed at the nerve of the man, but finally came to regard it as an idle boast. True to his word, Phillips went to the election ground. The Hatfields approached within gunshot distance and fired a volley through the brush and bushes, stampeding all but some eight or ten persons. The plucky little deputy sheriff remained till late in the afternoon, but the Hatfields withdrew. Inspiring example of what a brave, determined officer may do and it proves that with all their contempt for law and order deep down in the hearts of outlaws there is the fear of retribution and punishment. The little man had called their bluff because he had right on his side, and the nerve to contend for that right, and wherever there is a genuine determination to put an end to outlawry, it can be done, it matters not how desperate and vicious the outlaws may be.

Late in the fall of the same year Phillips, with three other men, crossed over into Logan County, W. Va., to receive the prisoners who had been arrested, as he supposed, on warrants issued by Governor Wilson after the issuance of the Kentucky governor’s requisitions.

After crossing the line between the two States he, for the first time, learned that no warrants had ever been issued, at least that no arrests had been made or even attempted. Then something happened. He and his men suddenly came upon Selkirk McCoy, Tom Chambers and Mose Christian, three of the murder clan that slew the McCoy brothers, and who were included in the requisitions. The opportunity to nab them was too good to resist the temptation to capture them, even without warrants, and it was done. He hurried them back and across the line into Kentucky, served them with Kentucky bench warrants and delivered them to the jailer at Pikeville.

The rage of the Hatfields over this “unlawful” arrest knew no bounds. It was an outrage, and a shameful violation of the law, they cried. They sought an outlet for their pent-up indignation and decided to make another attempt upon the life of old man McCoy.

For this purpose the leaders selected the most dangerous and desperate members of the clan.

At midnight, January 1st, 1888, this band of desperadoes, led by Cap Hatfield, heartless cutthroats all, surrounded the house of Randolph McCoy. On New Year, when every man and woman in the land should reflect regretfully upon the many follies and errors committed during the year gone by and good resolutions should fill every heart, on New Year’s night this outlaw band prepared to and did inaugurate another year of bloodshed and of horror.

Silently, with the stealth of Indians, the phantom shadows moved about the doomed homestead. They were in no hurry. It was far from their intention to break into the house and with a few well-directed shots put an end to the old man whom they had sworn to destroy. No! Such a death would have been too quick and painless. He must burn; they must maim and torture. What mattered it that women were in the house. “They will serve him for company,” chuckled the heartless Jim Vance. They must first be made to feel the impossibility of escape; to entertain their tormentors with their distress and horror. They must furnish sport, the sport the savages so much delighted in.