Hatfields and McCoys

[willis68]

This one is coming out on Blu Ray, I already pre ordered it I like it that much!

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Saw episode 1 and 2 of 3. Am not good with names or faces and get confused because they all look like crazy hillbillys to me. Not saying thats a bad thing, just difficult to understand the plot. Read the wikipedia hatfields and mccoys article, which may or may not be historically accurate but appears to agree with the first two pieces of the series. More closely than many "historical dramas". Just gonna take some study to understand the plot.

So the hatfields are W. VA conferderate sympathizers and pa hatfield deserted from the conferderates before end of hostilities and seems to be a decent businssman in the lumber trade. The McCoys (according to the show) are at least partially union sympathizers living in KY. The bro of pa mccoy enlists in the Union army, gets injured and discharged before end of the war, comes home and possibly gets offed by hatfields or hatfield lackeys. Pa mccoy enlisted in the confederate army, didn't desert like pa hatfield, got captured and suffered in Union prison camps till war's end, and holds resentment against his previous bud pa hatfield who deserted and went home to get a headstart on the lumber biz.

Then some lumber rights land disputes, a nasty court case involving the ownership of a pig that done been ate, where one of the mccoys on the jury decides against mccoys and for hatfields. The ambush shooting of a halfwit hatfield drunkard after a bar fight, committed by a couple of halfwit mccoys. The hatfield magistrate dismisses charges against the mccoy good old boys because he doesn't have evidence that it wasn't a self-defense shooting. Then a young hatfield lad with a promising future in moonshine has a fling with two mccoy gals, knocking up one and marrying the other. A ruckus and murder breaks out at a drunken rural shindig, so the mccoy miscreants get possibly illegally extradited to W. VA and then shot by hatfields some time later after the murder victim finally dies.

So the mccoys agitate and organize posse and rewards to bring the responsible hatfields to kentucky justice, dead or alive. Along with assorted sniping and bushwhacking in the hills between the two parties involved.

The plot is clear as mud so far but I might evetually get it if figured out. It is a convoluted plot deserving of a play by shakespeare. Tis a shame that shakespeare was dead and goe before he had opportunity to immortalize the plot.

[Oh Shoot]

...Tis a shame that shakespeare was dead and goe before he had opportunity to immortalize the plot.

Well, you could see it as an extended Capulet vs. Montague thang, involving, but just not centered around the opposing families' equivalents of Romeo and Juliet.

- OS

[Garufa]

Forsooth, youins.

[atlas3025]

Is been a good series...there are a lot of characters, but jeez, look at their family trees on wiki and you will see why. If they tried to boil it down and condense it, then we would cry foul because it wasn't accurate.

Interesting that according wiki, apparently, only one ACTUAL Hatfield died in the feud (meaning actually had the name "Hatfield"). Alternatively, it appears as many as 10 "real McCoys" got kilt.

Tom Berringer is particularly rough around the edges in the show.

Edited May 30, 2012 by atlas3025

[Guest oxfordgt]

I don't care if it's acurate or not. I am really enjoying it.

[Oh Shoot]

Forsooth, youins.

Gadzooks and zounds! Gird thy loins, varlets!

- OS

[Guest bkelm18]

Tom Berringer is particularly rough around the edges in the show.

Yeah, he plays a good Vance. You know when he's around, something's gonna go down.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Yep been enjoying it and will watch the final episode and probably try to re-watch the entire thing to get the plot sorted out. I'm just bad with names and faces so its hard to remember which bearded hillbillys are McCoys and which other bearded hillbillys are Hatfields. So far, every time somebody gets shot, it takes some effort to figure out what clan got shot and what clan did the shooting, because I don't remember them from when they were introduced earlier in the show. No complaint against the show, just my bad memory for names and faces.

I like the Hatfield photo on wikipedia. Mom had a bunch of old tintypes and paper photos of our ancestors and its not much different except GA-AL hillbillys and most of our family pics didn't include guns. Asked Mom why everybody in the old pictures looked like they were in pain or peed-off. She explained that it was considered "un-serious" to smile in a photo, and in addition the camera exposures had to be very long-- It was easier to hold a straight face for a long camera exposure. Dunno. My ancestors were not rich but all the pics were in suits. Seemed real important for everybody to have some kind of suit to wear back then, maybe because everybody went to church or you had to have a suit to wear on certain occasions to look "respectable"? I don't wear suits often so guess ain't very respectable.

[East_TN_Patriot]

...a nasty court case involving the ownership of a pig that done been ate...

All correct except this part. The pig had "done been et."

First two episodes were better than I expected. My wife even watched it last night and watched part of the re-run of the first episode that followed to get up to speed a bit. That is quite a big deal since she generally hates any shows related to history.

[TMF]

I'm diggin' this so far. Good series.

[Sniper23]

I've enjoyed the show even though I knew they'd add a Hollywood touch to the story. As an actual Vance who still visits this area of West Virginia every month to visit my family, it's interesting to see your family portrayed on tv.

[Guest bkelm18]

Wow, great series. Such a shame so much blood had to be shed.

[Volzfan]

Pretty good show!

[TN Outlaw]

love the show ill be buying the dvd

[BigK]

Not sure if it was a Hollywood spin or true, but the irony of how the 2 patriarchs' characters reversed is interesting.

[Ropin4gold]

I was skeptical at first, but this turned out to be a pretty entertaining show.

[gun sane]

It was a bit too highbrow for me.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

The show gave the impression them fellers would take a drink once in awhile.

[Garufa]

The show gave the impression them fellers would take a drink once in awhile.

I reckon they were no strangers to pulling a cork.

[Guest bkelm18]

It was a bit too highbrow for me.

It was on the History Channel, not HBO.

Edited June 2, 2012 by bkelm18

[Moped]

Saw episode 1 and 2 of 3. Am not good with names or faces and get confused because they all look like crazy hillbillys to me. Not saying thats a bad thing, just difficult to understand the plot. Read the wikipedia hatfields and mccoys article, which may or may not be historically accurate but appears to agree with the first two pieces of the series. More closely than many "historical dramas". Just gonna take some study to understand the plot.

So the hatfields are W. VA conferderate sympathizers and pa hatfield deserted from the conferderates before end of hostilities and seems to be a decent businssman in the lumber trade. The McCoys (according to the show) are at least partially union sympathizers living in KY. The bro of pa mccoy enlists in the Union army, gets injured and discharged before end of the war, comes home and possibly gets offed by hatfields or hatfield lackeys. Pa mccoy enlisted in the confederate army, didn't desert like pa hatfield, got captured and suffered in Union prison camps till war's end, and holds resentment against his previous bud pa hatfield who deserted and went home to get a headstart on the lumber biz.

Then some lumber rights land disputes, a nasty court case involving the ownership of a pig that done been ate, where one of the mccoys on the jury decides against mccoys and for hatfields. The ambush shooting of a halfwit hatfield drunkard after a bar fight, committed by a couple of halfwit mccoys. The hatfield magistrate dismisses charges against the mccoy good old boys because he doesn't have evidence that it wasn't a self-defense shooting. Then a young hatfield lad with a promising future in moonshine has a fling with two mccoy gals, knocking up one and marrying the other. A ruckus and murder breaks out at a drunken rural shindig, so the mccoy miscreants get possibly illegally extradited to W. VA and then shot by hatfields some time later after the murder victim finally dies.

So the mccoys agitate and organize posse and rewards to bring the responsible hatfields to kentucky justice, dead or alive. Along with assorted sniping and bushwhacking in the hills between the two parties involved.

The plot is clear as mud so far but I might evetually get it if figured out. It is a convoluted plot deserving of a play by shakespeare. Tis a shame that shakespeare was dead and goe before he had opportunity to immortalize the plot.

Pretty much what I got out of it too. However, one thing that I researched that I thought the movie did not portray correctly was the Civil War. Anderson and Randolph were not in the Confederate Army. They were part of a local Home Guard called the Logan Wildcats. I guess I think of them as Raiders, not soldiers. If that's the case, then I'm not sure that Anderson actually deserted. He just went home.

Another thing I read online was that Roseanna wasn't the virginal, "never been kissed before", young girl they protrayed her to be in the movie. She was actually older than Johnse by about 2 or 4 years and had enjoyed the "company" of men on other past occasions. Actually what happened was she saw dollar signs when she met Johnse, since the Hatfields were rich, by that areas standards. The other thing I read in several narratives was she didn't stay only one night in the Hatfield house and then go back home, but she stayed several months and that Sally McCoy sent Roseanna's sisters to talk her into coming home. After she went home and was treated cruelly, by her father, she went to her aunt's house, where she and Johnse kept up the love affair that resulted her becoming pregnant.

Other than that, I've really enjoyed the series. From all I have read about this on the internet, they did a good job with actually portraying what all went on. It seemed to me that except for two men, this would have never been a big drawn out affair. Those two men were Percy Cline on the McCoy side and Jim Vance on the Hatfield side.

Another interesting thing I read (only saw it the one time) on the internet, was when Anderson Hatfield got the 5000 acres from Percy Kline, he was only 13 at the time and a orphan under the care of a man named Dils, who was politically connected in the Commonwealth of Kentucky. One of his step brothers was said to have been Frank Phillips, the lawman that brought in most of the Hatfields. Also Frank did die of gun shot wounds, but it was several days after the fight and I don't think it was by his deputy, rather a man that he was attempting to capture in West Virginia, whom he also killed in the gunfight.

In the movie, Cottontop was the admitted bastard of Ellison Hatfield, but I don't think they told who his mother was. Supposedly, it was Ellison's and Anderson's first cousin.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Thanks Moped, very interesting details

Well, you could see it as an extended Capulet vs. Montague thang, involving, but just not centered around the opposing families' equivalents of Romeo and Juliet.

Forsooth, youins.

Gadzooks and zounds! Gird thy loins, varlets!

Dunno much about it, but the appalachians were supposedly settled by scotch irish and english who entered the hills around elizabethan times and though many descents kept moving west over the generations, the ones who stayed didn't travel far or often. I read that early 20th century musicologists were collecting appalachian folk songs only to discover that many appalachian song and lyrics are surprisingly accurate preservations of elizabethan popular song that the rest of the world mostly forgot until late 20th century brit folk revival bands dug out some of the old songbooks. Then you had hillbilly's and young long-haired brits singing the same songs.

Obviously they didn't have audio recording back in shakespeare's day. Perhaps people know the nature of the accent or perhaps not? Most likely probability zero, but I sometimes wonder, if the songs were preserved so faithfully in the hills, then maybe the accents were also faithfully preserved? Maybe Queen Elizabeth sounded like Elly May, and Sir Walter Raleigh talked like Jethro Bodine?

I reckon they were no strangers to pulling a cork.

Yup a bit of drinking in the series. Dunno if the show any way reflects reality, but as protrayed in the show that "last charge" of the hatfields and mccoys in the third episode, many of the characters were drunk on their butts.

Edited June 2, 2012 by Lester Weevils

[Garufa]

Lester, I imagine if you went up to the Kentucky-West Viginia border in the 1870's you'd have no idea what those people where talking about. Even today if you go far back enough up into the hills and talk to some old-timer it's a nodding and smiling affair as trying to figure out what they're saying is a chore.

I've heard some of the recordings of Appalachian folk made back in the 1930's or so. Even then they recorded the older ones. Mostly uneducated people, as the vast majority of Scots-Irish that settled the region where. I know it's English but it's not easy to understand.

[Caster]

I've heard some of the recordings of Appalachian folk made back in the 1930's or so. Even then they recorded the older ones. Mostly uneducated people, as the vast majority of Scots-Irish that settled the region where. I know it's English but it's not easy to understand.

Shooo, man imma tell ya!