Matewan Oral History Project Collection
Sc2003-135

Margaret Hatfield Interview

Becky Bailey: This is Becky Bailey for the Matewan Development Center. Twenty after ten on Friday, July 28, l989. I'm in the store operated and owned by Mrs. Margaret Casey, and I'm going to interview Margaret Hatfield. My first question, Ms. Hatfield, is when you were born and where you were born.

Margaret Hatfield: When I was born? May 13, 1943, at Ransom, Kentucky.

B: And who were your parents?

MH: My dad's name was James Birney Hatfield, my mother was Grace Davis Hatfield.

B: Okay, and you say you're related to the...the infamous Hatfield Clan? Did you say that?

MH: Well, certainly. There...all Hatfields--sooner or later--are related. About, oh, 1790, just about the time Kentucky became a separate state, a separate part of...separated from Virginia, a man came in here, 1795 is the exact date, a man came in here from Virginia, his name was Effram(?) Hatfield. And he settled on Blackberry Creek, somewhere in the neighborhood of where th...what they call the Preacher Anse Hatfield Cemetery is now. He had two sons whose names were Joseph and Valentine. Now their mother was a woman, I think her name was Mary Smith, and she had died in childbirth, and he married another woman--her name was Ann McKinney Musick. She had some children from a previous marriage, and then they had some children. So, there's two different sets of Hatfields; but, resulting from that half family. But all Hatfields are--sooner or later--related. And most of 'em are more related than most; because, when they came in here, they intermarried with Vance family. And I think at one time...I sat down while running my family tree out. I can run it back three ways to Effraim Hatfield; and, about four ways to a man named Edgar Vance, who came here about...oh, a little before Effraim Hatfield did.

B: So how would you...how would you have been related, however distantly, to, say, Devil Anse Hatfield?

MH: Well...my great-grandfather, my great-great-grandfather--whose name was McGinnis Hatfield--was, to the best of my ability to research it, a double first cousin to Devil Anse Hatfield. And then also, on my mother's side of the family...Let's see, her great grandmother was a sister to Devil Anse's father. We are an inbred people. I once asked my dad, I said, "The way we're inbred, it's a wonder we're not crazy." He said: "Who said we ain't?" (Laughing)

B: Do you think the, uh, the lack of people in this area was one of the reasons they inbred like they did? Or what's your..?

MH: Yeah. Well, I mean if you didn't...if you didn't marry... If you married locally, you were going to marry your kin. And if you didn't want to marry locally, you had to go...clear beyond, and that, that, was a big reason for it. Another thing, too, I think, was very much like...They brought it from England with 'em to keep property together, to marry within families an...and keep property together, because...good farmland was at a premium. There's an awful lot of hillside, "billy goat land," and very little good farmland; so, it made sense to...Land married land. And then there were some men that married, uh, a girl--no matter how ugly she was-- to get a good piece of land.

B: I know you've done a lot of research, but have there been any stories that passed down through the family about, say, what this area was like, say, a hundred and fifty years ago when...when Devil Anse would have been a young person?

MH: It was wild. (Laughing) It was pretty much like the frontier, Daniel Boone's frontier. The cash income that came out of this area --I have heard my great-grandmother tell these stories--the cash income that came out of this area was from trapping and selling furs, selling beeswax, and, you know, stuff...stuff like that. In order to get salt...in order to get salt, they had to go to Maldens over in the Kanawha Valley, where the...where the salt licks were, and bring it back here on mules. And anything that was brought in and out of here was pretty much... that was...that was ...they lived...there really wasn't much difference in...up until the coming of the railroads in 1890. There wasn't much difference in the lifestyle of this area, and what it had been on the American frontier, on the pre-Revolutionary War American frontier.

B: Okay. So that lifestyle lasted longer in...in this valley th..?

MH: It did, yes. There was one--I forget who it was--an English sociologist, that came in here and studied the people of Appalachia in the eighteen and nineties. He called them "yesterday's people," who are contemporary ancestors, and, really, there were areas--even when I was a small child--there were areas that were still very, very much like that...with roads hadn't gotten through yet. Where the...well, the Rural Electrication Administration, the REA, in the '30's, took electricity and, during World War II, took electricity into areas that had never...well--like up in the head of Blackberry Creek--didn't get electricity until World War II. Neither did Beech Creek. Blackberry Creek didn't get telephones 'til I was...Oh, I s'pose I was nine or ten years old before they took telephones all the way up through there, and they had to take up a subscription service. Beech Creek did not get telephones until the first year I taught school, which was 1964. So these areas were isolated, and, because of that, a culture survived that wouldn't have... wouldn't have lasted somewhere else, wouldn't have lasted in contact with...

B: Now we've had some social historians put forth the idea that part of the reason the feud sprang up between Devil Anse and Randall McCoy, was that Randall McCoy represented the traditional culture, and Devil Anse had bought into the new industrial type culture and was a local entrepreneur. If you will, what do you think of that theory?

MH: Well...I'll give it a certain amount of credibility. The problems as I've understood 'em, and have heard about 'em all my life ...The problems between the Hatfields and McCoys were economic. Some of it, I think--and from a purely objective viewpoint--I think it was a matter of jealousy. Because the Hatfields...well, the Hatfields got here first. They married the Vances, they married the Ferrells, they married the families that were here that had the good river bottom land; the richest, the most productive land. And they...they had more th...th...The first come, first served. The ones that came later had to go up the hollers, and up the creeks, and find what they could find--and where they could find it. And where you've got "haves," and "don't haves," and "have nots," you're going to have a certain amount of jealousy. And also, although I dearly love them, and I am extremely proud of them, the Hatfields can have an attitude about them.

B: Okay. Uh.

MH: Another thing, too, that I think...this is something I don't.. ..Because you have to be familiar with the families and know the way they...the way they think, the way they act, and what have you. I think one of the things that sort of kept the edge on the feud and kept it going...The Hatfield family is notorious for this; they're just as quick to joke as they are to fight--maybe quicker. And they're known for their wit. They would much rather whip you with their tongue, than whip you with their fist. And they'll say things that get repeated, and I think...Now, Randall McCoy was a very proud and a very sensitive old man. And he let the Hatfields know that they could aggravate him, and, naturally, they did. (Laughing) One thing went to another one. I'm sure that after... well, now as I said, I understand that there were problems dating back to the Civil War; when a man named Harmon McCoy, who was Randall's brother, I believe, was found killed in a cave up on Peter Creek. That was blamed on Devil Anse Hatfield, which, probably, Devil Anse didn't do it; more likely his Uncle, Jim Vance, did it. But anyway, it was...it was Hatfield one way or the next. But it started from that and it...it went on one thing or another. But when they had that famous "hog trial" on Blackberry, when the...the decision came in, of course, wh...One of the McCoys--they had six Hatfields, six McCoys--only one of the McCoys said that the evidence proved that...proved that the hog belonged to Floyd Hatfield. Now that McCoy's name was Selkirk McCoy. He was a McCoy from up at Sulphur Creek; his mother was a Vance, and he had several sisters who were married to Hatfields. He was really more...In a way, that...that set of McCoys were more Hatfield than they were McCoy. But, after...after the trial was over and it was decided that the pig was given to a...to Floyd Hatfield, when they got outside the...outside the building, Randall McCoy cussed 'em all, threw rocks at 'em, and just had a...called them liars, and this, that, and the other, in front of God and all kinds of witnesses. And, always in growing up, this was something we were taught--that Hatfields did not throw fits like that; that that was childish, that you just didn't act that way. You either...if somebody jumped on you, you either settled it there, or you walked off. You didn't throw rocks, you didn't shake your fist, and whoop, and holler, and cuss. And I am sure--after knowing the Hatfields as I do--I'm sure after that, that everytime Randall McCoy got out and, uh...got out in a crowd, somebody did a barnyard imitation of a pig at him. And, yeah, just enough to keep the old man, just enough to let him know that they hadn't forgotten that...forgotten how he'd acted at the election. And then, too, I think that there was a certain amount of political stir in this. Because the Hatfields controlled the land from Wharncliffe, the rich coal...coal areas from Wharncliffe --the Hatfields and their relatives from Wharncliffe--all the way down to, oh...almost Aflex, Kentucky. And this is the very heart of the "billion dollar coal field;" this is just taking the middle out of it. Blackberry Creek was Hatfield from the head to the mouth, Mate Creek, Thacker...Old man Jim Vance--it's rather interesting when you start thinking about this--old man Jim Vance was killed, I think about 1892 or sometime like that. Now he owned...uh...he and Cap Hatfield--who was Devil Anse's son--they owned most of Thacker Holler, and up--what they call Grapevine in the books--what's now called Thacker No. 11. It's real interesting to me that shortly after they were run out of there, the...the Thacker Coal Company opened that up, that was the first big coal camp in Mingo County. Now, I have a feeling that there were politicians and lawyers that kept the trouble stirred, in order to profit as agents of coal companies and holding companies. As a matter of fact, given enough time--if I had world enough and time--I could probably prove it.

B: Do you happen...do you know an approximate date when Vance was run out of...out of that area?

MH: About 1892 I'm going to say; 1890, '92, something like that.

B: Without some...some indication that this was a...There was a community here in Matewan even before the railroad. Do you know what..?

MH: It was called Ferrell's Branch.

B: Ferrell's Branch. Okay. What was here, do you know, before the railroad?

MH: I think...Well, over in the mouth of Warm Hollow, there's a house that belonged to Anderson Ferrell. Now, he married to Devil Anse Hatfields' sister, if I'm not mistaken. And there...I believe there was a store here, and--other than that you know--just a store, and probably a post off...there was a post office around here somewhere. And that was about the...well, that was about as much as there was to any mountain...mountain community at that time.

B: Do you know, uhmm...ha...have you heard much or...or run across much information on Devil Anse's timber business? I mean what kind of a timber business was going on in this area?

MH: Well, the kind of timber business they had was in the winter months; from the fall on. They cut timber, and they sk...brought it out...hauled it out of the mountains with horses or mules. They stacked it up and they waited for the spring, for the rains, when the river came up. And they would fasten those logs together with chains, and they rode those rafts down the river. They took them to Catlettsburg, Kentucky, and sold them. That went on until the early nineteen hundreds. I've heard my grandpa tell about riding the lumber rafts.

B: How old was he?

MH: He was born in 1889.

B: Okay. And it...Was that the gist of his story? That he can remember riding the rafts..?

MH: That he...yeah...He took...He rode the lumber rafts. They'd start out here with 'em, and they were made with a big sweep oar on the back of them so you could get 'em around--of course, you had to wait for real high water--and they'd ride those things. And what they'd do about a mile above where they intended to tie up for the night, they'd start hauling 'em. For some...you know, whoever it was to come out. And they'd throw the rope in, and they'd run that thing around a tree so they could bank that raft. It took...it took you a good half mile to...because one of those rafts was, oh.. ..twenty-five feet long maybe. Usually, some of them had a shack built on them where they could get in out of the weather.

B: Hmmm. How long a trip did it..? I mean how long..?

MH: It usually took, uh, uh, two days and a night. But I'd say it would depend on how swift the river was; how high the river was. But when it started getting dark, you had to tie up, because you couldn't risk trying to make those bends on that thing. Because rafts broke up and men got drowned. Either got drowned, or crushed between the logs, or...Now, my grandfather used to tell about his uncle, what they'd do they'd take these log rafts to Catlettsburg and they would sell logs. Well, they did that long after the railroads came on because that was the cheapest way. They'd sell logs or you...The men who rode the log rafts were in partnership on them, and I've heard my grandpa tell about his uncle. He got his share of the money and got drunk in Catlettsburg and had to walk home. The rest of 'em...the rest of them rode the train, and his uncle walked.

B: What was his uncle's name?

MH: His uncle's name was Greeley Hatfield.

B: They wouldn't give him the fare home? They made him walk?

MH: Now what happened was, that he got drunk and when they got ready to leave...My great-grandfather was his brother, and he was a teetotaler, and he didn't have much patience with drunks. And when they got ready to leave he couldn't find Greeley, and he knew where...he just knew where Greeley was. So, he said let him get home the best way he can. And, oh--three or four days later--they looked over the tunnel hill, down there at--below town--there used to be a road across the top of that knoll. He looked, and here come Greeley staggering in. He'd walk...had walked from Catlettsburg.

B: Wh...another question I have for you is...In our interviews we've...we've been hearing Devil Anse was the kindest, most gentlest man that you'd ever want to meet.

MH: That is what I have...have heard of him all of my life. I've never heard a bad word spoken of Devil Anse Hatfield. Most of the old people...Now, the term "devil" can mean more than one thing. And most of the ole...the way the old people...The people I knew when I was a child, the language they spoke, really, an outsider would do well to pick up three out of every seven words. Because it was a different...it was a cross between, well, they say, Medieval or Shakespearean English. It was that to a certain degree, it was that and it was lowland Scot. And the term "devil" doesn't necessarily mean somebody who is bad, or mean, or, you know, something like that. The term "devil" can mean to prank and tease and aggravate the daylights out of somebody. It doesn't necessarily mean that they're...that they're bad. And most people said that was--the old people who knew him--said that that was how he came by that name, that it wasn't because...And if you get into history ...into the history, it cannot be proved that Devil Anse Hatfield ever killed anybody. And it is very doubtful that he did. Now as far as I have been able to tell about the feud, if you want to find...The really rough customer was Jim Vance--who was Devil Anse's uncle, the Ferrell uncle--and a lot of the old people called him "Bad Jim Vance," and some of 'em called him "Crazy Jim Vance." And, evidently, he was a...I have seen pictures of him and he was a tough looking old "coodger." And, evidently, he was just as bad as he looked; because, for example, the burning of the McCoy house over...Devil Anse and Elias Hatfield and Wall Hatfield, none of the ...they weren't there. Jim Vance led that raid. And he had with him a bunch of young boys; Johnse, Cap, and Bob Hatfield, I think. And, well, Ellison's oldest son, his name, I think, was Elliott--they called him "Injun." A group like that...We're talking about boys seventeen and eighteen years old. Now, the oldest one of them was probably Johnsey, maybe at about twenty-one, twenty or twenty-one. But he was the one that led that raid, it is very likely that Jim Vance was the one who led the... when they took the McCoy's back into Kentucky. A lot of people said that Devil Anse and Wall were not...Devil Anse, Wall, or Elias were never on the Kentucky side of the river, and I don't think they were. But Jim Vance was. So, a lot...I think an awful lot of stuff got blamed on Devil Anse Hatfield, really wasn't his doing. It didn't do him any good to deny it, so, he just let them believe what they wanted to. I don't think there was ever--they said the Hatfields wouldn't talk about this, that, or the other, and they wouldn't tell this, that, or the other--I don't think they ever covered anything up, I think they just let people believe, you know they figured they would anyway, so they let them believe what they wanted to.

B: What do you think the connection was then between Devil Anse and...and his Uncle Jim? Do you think it was...Devil Anse just didn't want to say, "No, it wasn't me, it was my uncle," because of family pride? That he didn't want to indicate that it was..?

MH: Nobody would have believed him if he had've said it! Devil Anse Hatfield was a remarkable personality, he drew attention, whereas Jim Vance didn't. It's just like...Which you gonna notice, a wolf or a jackal? But which is more dangerous?

B: So you're saying that Devil Anse was the wolf, and Jim Vance was the jackal?

MH: Yeah. Jim...I think Jim Vance did things solely for meanness, just for plain ordinary meanness.

B: Now, I've heard some stories about Elliott, the one they called "Injun," now, was that "Injun" as in Indian or..?

MH: That was "Injun" as in Indian, yelp. And I understand that he got that name because of using signals, bird calls, and stuff like that...and guerilla warfare. Now, it may have been because he looked like an Indian, I...but that's the story I heard.

B: Okay. What stories have...have you heard about the romance between Roseanne and Johnsey?

MH: Well, my great-grandmother--who was married when she's about sixteen to Roland T. Hatfield--she came from over on Big Creek, originally, her name was Laddie Gooslin, and she grew up partly over on Little Blackberry with the McCoy girls. And from the stories I have heard...Now, there's something we got to remember about Roseanne and Johnse, Roseanne was a couple of years older than he. Now, Roseanne--whereas it is a beautiful, tragic "Romeo and Juliet" story--Roseanne did what she wanted to, and nothing could be done about it, because she was too old. She was big enough, and old enough, and ugly enough, to do what she wanted to, when she wanted to, with whom she wanted to. And that's one thing when you think... you're thinking about, uh...a sixteen year old girl saddling up a horse and taking across Dark Mountain. That's one...We're not talking about a sixteen year old girl, we're talking about a woman twenty-two, twenty-three years old. And we're also talking about somebody that had been around horses and mules ever since she could walk; and, it would have been a worse disgrace not to know how to do it, than it would have been to know how to do it. But the thing of it is that I...some...some of the rhyme...some of the rhyme and reason to it, I don't understand atall. Like I have never been able to understand when she broke free...When she rode across the mountain down here from Burnwell...Now that old logging camp was down there at the mouth of where Cumberland Village is now, what's called Becky Ferrell Branch. When she...when she came out of Burnwell and crossed the river and went down there to the logging camp to tell the Hatfields that they'd gotten Johnse and started fight with him, I don't know why in the world she didn't stay at that logging camp if Johnse Hatfield was what she wanted, why she took out and went back to Burnwell...that was...Because they...they would not have run her off, and I mean, especially, if she had told them that she was pregnant. I'm sure they wouldn't have. The thing of it was that she was older than Johnse, and the moral code of the hills--especially among the women--even when I was young, was awfully, awfully stern. And she did what she did, and they disapproved of it. I mean there wasn't considered to be nothing worse than a loose woman, and that was a big part of the problem. Th... There's all kind of stories about what happened to Roseanne, and what happened to the child. The story that my grandmother told... and I once heard her and my Aunt Pricey Scott, and Nancy Jane Vern, he whipped that out, and all of 'em were that age. Roseanne got German Measles; she miscarried as a result of German Measles, er... the baby was born premature as a result of that. The baby died about almost at birth, or immediately afterwards, and it was always my understanding that Roseanne died shortly...she died of complications probably from the miscarriage and improper care, and this, that, and the other. She wasn't around three, or four, or five years years later moaning, and moping, and pining over Johnse, she ...that girl was dead.

B: Right. I'd heard that from...from Basil Hatfield. He told me a very similar story.

MH: That's... that's probable. Now, they say that she's buried in the old cemetery over at Pikeville. I always heard she was buried at Stringtown.

B: Why was that? I mean, do you know why she would have been buried at Stringtown?

MH: Because that's where she lived. She stayed over there with her aunt and uncle. Now, she...after she...you know she stayed about a year at the Hatfields, after she left the election and rode home behind Johnse. Now, there's... oh, there's been all kinds of... she was afraid of the storm, and this, that, and the other. She wasn't. The way paths ran then--and they didn't run the way the road run--she wasn't a half mile away from home across Blackberry Mountain. I mean, that girl had been farther under the floor hunting eggs than she was away from home. And there was not a house on Blackberry were she couldn't have stayed the night. She went to Freeburn with Johnse Hatfield because she wanted to, not because she had to, not because she was scared of anything. And her daddy couldn't do anything about it, because she was over age. He sent...he did send her sisters up there trying to get her to come home and she wouldn't do it. And, of course, I'm sure the Hatfields thought it was funny, they...because they were aggravating the tar and feathers off Randall McCoy. But, anyway, uh...after she left the Hatfields and went back home--now she was not pregnant at the time she left the Hatfield house, th...this...well the... chronology of it makes it impossible--she went back home... The stories I always heard, was that her father was awful mean to her and she left and went to Stringtown. Now, I heard stories--and these were from people that saw it and knew what they were talking about--they say he whipped her with a horse bridle, which was not thought of as very nice treatment to do. Anyway, she left and went to Stringtown. Of course, being over in Stringtown--what's now called Burnwell--that meant that all Johnse had to do was cross the river and walk up on top of the ridge and she could meet him up there in the bushes. Which, I think, that evidently went on for some time before...Well, it did. Because they...that's how...how the Kentucky law found out; started tracking him, and caught him, and picked him up. And, of course, the Hatfields went and took him away from the Kentucky law over on oh...about the foot of the Coeburn Mountain on Big Creek.

B: So was...would...In reality would she have been dead? Would Roseanne have been dead by the time that Johnsey married her cousin? Or..?

MH: She may have. I don't think...As I've said, from the accounts that I heard, uh...I don't know if there is really an accurate record of when she did die. I think that they possibly used her for bait. I think that maybe the idea was to make Johnse Hatfield think that she was still alive a long time...they were using her for bait.

B: We were just talking about the...the romance between Johnse and Roseanne.

MH: Because at that time, they had...they had warrants out for just about half of the Hatfield family. They...not only warrants out, they had bounties out on 'em. And I, a few years back, told uh...uh...a meeting of the Fiscal Court in Pikeville, that the Hatfields had paid taxes in Kentucky for two hundred years and all we'd ever gotten from it was a bounty put on our heads. But they had bounties out on Devil Anse, Weis, Wall, Johnse, Cap, old man Jim Vance...I don't know...Lord, I don't know how many of 'em. And I...as I said, I think they used Roseanne for bait 'cause they knew if they could get one Hatfield, the rest of 'em would...would come. And they did figure on, uh...Sometimes when I get myself cranked up in romantic mood, it is one of the most pathetic love stories in history. Because there was no...Well, really and truthfully what it...what Johnse Hatfield should have done, was took Roseanne and left, because she died as a result of it, and he never was...Johnse was probably the best one, the most promising one of the bunch, and as a result of the things that came out of that, he never...he died like 45 of alcoholism...maybe...I don't know if he was even 45. They finally caught up with him and he... he left here and went clear into Oregon. And he came back, and he was arrested somewhere down in Kentucky, I think right around Morehead. He did some time in the Pen, and he was released from the Pen. He was pardoned from the penitentiary, because in a prison riot, uh... a black man had overpowered the warden and was holding him hostage and Johnse Hatfield wasn't a real big man--he's about six feet tall, maybe 180 pounds--Johnse Hatfield jumped that black man from behind and cut his throat with a pocket knife, and saved the wardens life. And that's how he got paroled from the Kentucky penitentiary. And he came back, he...I don't know what he...He did some land agent work for one of the coal companies, but he fell dead of a heart attack when he was about--I don't know--43, 44, 45 years old.

B: How about Devil Anse's other sons? How did the feud and all that affect, say, Cap?

MH: Well, Cap seemed to enjoy it. Cap...Cap used to...well, the way...Cap's name was William Anderson Hatfield, Jr. How he came by the name of Cap, he did what every young 'un had been told not to do, five thousand times. Old fashioned guns loaded with cap and ball, there's a percussion tip that fit on the part of the gun called a nipple part of the revolver. You loaded the charge, a powdered ball, in there and then that percussion tip is what set it off. Now, they did...I think he probably told the story himself --that he was so mean that his brother shot his eye out, or he shot his own eye out, or something like that. That wasn't what happened. He took a percussion cap--when he was about eight, or nine, or ten years old--laid it on a rock, hit it with another rock, and it went off and put his eye out. But, Cap actually seemed to revel, and just enjoy, the reputation of being a...a bad Hatfield. When he died, about 1930...John Hopkins Hospital, in Baltimore, they did an autopsy on him; and, they found a bullet, or a fragment of a bullet, that had been imbedded in his brain for years. And, as a result of that, they seemed to think that maybe he was brain damaged, ummm...a little bit crazy. The way he acted did...did confirm that, because Cap was an ardent follower of old man Jim Vance, and he did do a great deal to keep it stirred up. As a matter of fact, Cap had his own private little feud at the 1898 uh...presidential election here in Matewan.

B: What happened in that?

MH: He kills a Chambers. I think the man's name was Henderson Chambers. Cap and his stepson, a boy named Joe Glen, and two or three more, they got up here where Mate Creek comes out, up there in that rockbar, and started shooting down through town. That stepson of his, Joe Glen, got sent to reform school for it, and they put Cap in the county jail for awhile. And I don't know what they did with the... what they did with the rest of them. But that ain't nothing whatsoever to do with the Hatfield-McCoy Feud. There ...I've seen attempts in books to tie that in, but that was Cap's own little private business; that had nothing to do with the feud.

B: Wh...what was his reason for shooting Henderson?

MH: Probably...Henderson Chambers? Probably something to do over the election. Now, it probably...it was probably something to do about the election, because they tend to take their poli...politics very seriously indeed.

B: In your research I ca...I can tell you've done quite a lot. How do you think...how di...did the rest of the family...I know we've talked now about Johnse and Cap...How do you think the families--in the aftermath of the feud, the hostilities of the feud--what do you think happened to the families afterwards?

MH: Well, do you mean Devil Anse's immediate family? Now, you've got something you have to remember about the families that were involved in the feud. Of the entire Hatfield Clan, there was never more than two or three families directly involved in the feud. Most of 'em, an awful lot of 'em, had nothing whatsoever to do with it. And, I don't think it bothered them very much atall. Now, Devil Anse...As a result of the feud, his brother, Elias, his brother, Wall, they lost tremendous tracks of land because they had to get away from the Kentucky border. They were raiding, uh...sending deputy sheriffs on illegal raids...As a matter of fact, West Virginia and Kentucky almost went to war over that. They were sending kidnapping raids in there for...That came to a...that came to a head in, oh...like 1892, in what they called the Battle of Grapevine, when the Kentucky deputies came over there and they... Ah, they killed a West Virginia deputy by the name of White, and I forget who else. And that was...that was the last time that Devil Anse was ever seen having anything to do with the feud, and it should give you an idea of what kind of a man he was. Because in 1892, Devil Anse was over 50 years old. I mean we're talking about an old gray headed grandpa. They said he was up in the timber, up in the edge of the timber. Now, Devil Anse Hatfield was about, well, I...One story I remember, I was teaching West Virginia History at Red Jacket, and I read a quotation from a book to my class, and it was a description that Randall McCoy made of Devil Anse Hatfield; said he was six foot of devil, a hundred and eighty pounds of hell, and one of the kids looked up at me and said, "It must run in the family." (laughter) Anyway...which left me without much to say there from...But, Devil Anse wasn't a tremendously big man. He was poisonously accurate with a gun. Now, Hatfields were born with gun powder in their veins, I've got it in mine, I love a gun better than anything I ever saw in my life. I'd rather...I'd rather have a good thirty-thirty than a date with Tom Selleck. Anyway, well, it'll...it'd last longer. But, anyway, he was, as I said, deadly poisonous with a rifle or pistol. Devil Anse was back up in that timber, and he was a big part of what was holding...holding the deputies off to let the others get away. Well, he saw his nephew "Injun," Elliot, go down. He was shot in the leg. Uh...now "Injun" Hatfield was about six three and he weighed way over two hundred pounds. He saw him go down and he... he was shot through the leg, he couldn't...he was trying to drag himself off. They said Devil Anse moved from tree to tree, "injuning" his way down like an "injun" coming through the trees. When he got down there to where "Injun" Hatfield was on the ground, he reached over and he's got that thirty...that, well, I...well, it wasn't a thirty-thirty, it was a Winchester Yellow Boy which is a 38...a 38-caliber carbine. And they used those because that and a thirty-eight special fired the same ammunition. You didn't have to carry two different...you didn't have to worry about jamming your gun by putting the wrong shell in it. They said he had that caught under his... that Yellow Boy Carbine caught under his right arm, held down...He was firing it like a pistol. He reaches down and he gets "Injun" Hatfield--who is much bigger than he is--he takes him by the belt and hauls him up on his feet. He put him over his shoulder, in a fireman's carry, and he went up that hill walking backwards shooting down through there. And, of course, now, he was...he was the prize. Devil Anse was...if they could've...dead or alive...if they could've gotten him...I mean this was... was all there was to it. He's back up through the trees. They say he threw "Injun" across a horse's saddle, slapped that horse on the rump, jumped up on another horse, turned around, fired two or three shots, and took off through the timber. That was some old man. If he could do that when he was nearly 60 years old, imagine what he must have been like at 30, 25 or 30. Course, he might not have been that good, he might not have been that cool.

B: Were there...Are there other things about the feud that you know that I haven't asked you about? Could...Any stories that you've heard that we've might not have mentioned so far?

MH: Well, there is one story. And it does pertain to my family, my mother's family--her mother's side of the family--his last... their last name was Keesee. Her grandmother...my mother's grandmother, Lydia Keesee, was a...was born in North Carolina, she was Cherokee Indian. Now, she left out of there with...at the time of removal, when they...the trail appears when they took the... when they took the Cherokee to Oklahoma. And the one's that could, get away from there, and renegade out, and hide, did. But, she came to this country--she was raised over on Big Creek, in Forest Hills, that area--she came here when she was about twelve years old. She was about four foot eleven, her hair hung all the way down to the tail of her skirt, and they said she could take her hatchet or butcher knife and throw it off the flat of her hand:"ca-whap!" She never would admit that she was an Indian, because there were bounties out on the Cherokee. You could like...Wolves, bobcats, hawks, what have you, if you could find them a genuine one--I guess alive or dead--if you could find them one and turn it in, they could send it to Oklahoma, and you'd get maybe $50, which was a large sum of cash money. And this went clear down to...down to "eighth-breeds." That kinda rattled my slats, when--I guess I was about eighteen or nineteen years old--first time I ever read that in a book, and it was "Contemporary Account of the Cherokee Removal," and they were describing the rounding up of the Indians, and what have you, and one of the things th...and it was uh... uh...accounts from a Northern newspaper, which didn't make me like Yankees any better than I had before. Th...they were describing them and they said they came in "breech clouts" and buckskin, and this, that, and the other. And they said...and blonde-haired "eighth breeds" that you couldn't tell from white. And I said, "Wait a minute, children, I am an "eighth breed." You mean, uh...and th...I mean now that's what hits you, right there in the gut. Because when you know that with nothing but what you could carry in your hands--not because you done anything, just because your great-grandmother was an Indian--everything you had was going to be taken from you, and you were going to be sent to Oklahoma. That's the reason she never would tell; she didn't deny it, she just wouldn't say nothing. But, after the burning of the McCoy house, uh...that party that did that stopped at the Keesee house on the way back and, well, everybody knew what she was...everybody knew she was an Indian. I mean, the fact that she didn't admit it didn't have anything to do with it. It...told...told on itself. But, anyway, Jim Vance and that group stopped at the house and they hollered, and her husband, Butch Keesee, went out there to see what they wanted, and he wanted to know if any of that family had escaped and possibly come there to hide. Butch Keesee told him, no, they hadn't, and he said he was going to search the house anyway. Well, at that point, Lydia Keesee comes to the door, all four foot eleven of her, with her hair hanging down to the bottom of her gown, with a "corn-cutting" butcher knife --a big long butcher knife--in her hand. She said, "No, Jim Vance, you're not searching this house." He turned around and left.

B: That's a good story.

MH: Don't nobody mess with an Indian squaw.

B: How about the Civil War? What kind of stories got passed down in this area about what went on in the Civil War?

MH: The Civil War--apparently in this area--was mostly a guerilla type thing, and the stories that I heard, such few of them as there were...It was skirmishes, of course, some of the men from this area went away from here and went with the regular armies. Ellison Hatfield was with General Pickett. Um...some of the others...but.. ..they call...well, what was called "irregulars," and from the stories I've heard "irregular" wutn't too much better than cattle thief. I mean, they just used it as, uh...an excuse to get out and thump up on whoever they didn't like, and steal hogs, and cows, and chickens, ducks, and ninnies. I've not heard very many glorious stories about...

B: I've heard some from the old-timers saying that the--I guess it was the "irregulars" then--where they said both sides raided for food and it was the people here who were victims of both sides. It wasn't just one side or the other.

MH: They were. It was whoever come through. And then another thing that the area, I think, suffered from, was stragglers from both armies, draft dodgers...This...this has always been a wonderful place for people to hide, because of its inaccessibility. And, as a result, they attracted the element that had something to hide. I'm trying to be as nice about it as I can.

B: Ummm, we were talking earlier about, uh...Mr. Buskirk, and I was going to ask you what kind of stories did you hear about the "Blue Goose Saloon?" We've been trying to piece together some information on the "Blue Goose Saloon."

MH: Well, the "Blue Goose" was a saloon, and, at one time in history, it was said that Matewan was probably the roughest, toughest little border town north of hell. And, I am sure, that the "Blue Goose" lent it's distinction to the...to the whole...to the whole thing. It was like most saloons, it was a saloon that was a gambling joint. It was...I don't think that it specialized in bad women. There was another establishment in town that did that.

B: What was that?

MH: You don't know?

B: Aunt Carey's?

MH: Well, now Aunt Carey's was...was at a later date. There was one over behind the railroad track. That old building in th... beside of...that old B & C Oil Company building, and...It's not there anymore. It was a bordello, and uh...to my understanding it did a very thriving business. Of course, it was gone by the time I got there. Now, Aunt Carey, whom I remember well, was a black lady, she came here...When she first appeared in this country, she came here as Bob Buskirk's cook. And then she went on to Carey... Carey...I don't know that Carey ever really ran a whore house. She had all these girls that stayed there, and I guess what they did was their business, Carey didn't nose into it. But Carey bootlegged and...just whatever it took to get by. She lived 'til... Lord, she must have been a hundred and ten years old when she died. She lived 'til after oh...I graduated from high school, 1960. She's...about then is when she died.

B: Can you name the name of the uh...bordello across the tracks? We haven't had many people be forthcoming about what was here and...

MH: Who's going to hear this?

B: Well, we're going to make it available to...to historians and researchers. You don't nece...If you can name...Can you name the name of the place without naming the proprietor?

MH: No, because it went by the proprietress' name. Or, that was all I ever heard it called by.

B: Well, if you'd rather not, I mean, we can let it go at that.

MH: Well, th...I don't think it's any deep, dark secret. The woman's name was Meg Daniels. I don't see why it should be a deep, dark secret.

B: Well, now, I understand the sly smiles I've been getting when I ask about Meg Daniels. (Laughing) Do you know about roughly what time...I know Basil Hatfield, who's 86, remembers her so about what time would you...

MH: Meg Daniels...Meg Daniels, I don't think, died 'til the late '40's. I'm pretty sure she didn't.

B: What kind of, uh...stories did you hear about her personality? Basil told me a story about her curing a...knowing how to cure a horse's bellyache.

MH: Well, that could be. The stories that I heard about her personality...She's supposed to have been one of the kindest women that ever lived. She was good to everybody. She did for people nobody else would do for. People didn't think th...it...really... Most people didn't think ill of old Meg. She made her living, she didn't ask nobody for nothing, she didn't lie, steal or cheat, or try to beat anybody out of money. People didn't really think ill of her.

B: Wh...In a town...Even at it's height it probably had about a thousand people, how did...how did the local prostitutes, how did they fit into the society, were they shunned like in the larger places?

MH: Well, you knew who they were. When I was a kid there used to be two or three beer joints around here in town where the old gals hung out, and you knew what they were doing there. And then, gradually, the unpaid amateurs drove the paid professionals out of... (Laughing)...out of business. They weren't ex...well, they weren't high faluting society by any means, but as far as shun, no, you... They were just there. As far as getting out and throwing rocks at them, or anything like that, no.

B: As a person who does research, what kind of profile did they fit? Were they, say, widows or...or...or were divorced?

MH: No. Some of them...well, they...Some of them, I guess, were widows. Because, used to be, an awful lot of men got killed in timbering accidents and mines, and this, that, and the other. Most of them, though, were young girls out of the head of the creek and here and there that...from big families and they wanted to taste of a little livelier life, wanted more spending money. Most of those old girls did that and ended up marrying somebody, and ended up raising a family, and if you'd mention so and so they'd go, "Oh, I can remember when she was 'tom cat's kitten.'" But...uh...they they weren't really ostracized, not really an outcast element.

B: How about the...the Italian, Rock? No one can remember his last name. You...Would you know his last name?

MH: If I ever knew it, I have forgotten it. Now, Rock is buried up at North Matewan up on that Maynard Cemetery, on the side of the hill. There's a mausoleum, I think, up there, I'm sure his last name is on that. Rock was killed when I was about four or five years...about four years old. I barely can remember that.

B: Do you know the details of...of...was he killed by a gambler or..?

MH: He was killed by a police officer; Basil Hatfield's brother, Alan. I forget what the...I forget what the fret was about. Rock was meaner than a stripped snake. And everybody was afraid of him, and I forget what the details...I forget what...what it was that surrounded...But Alan Hatfield's the one that killed him. Rock ran a grocery store up there, oh...just beyond the underpass. There was an old two-story wooden building, frame building.

B: One of the big events before World War I, in this larger area, was the Glen Alum Robbery.

MH: Well now, there were a lot of people that thought Rock had something to do with that. There was Italians that came in here--I never did know a great deal about that--I remember hearing my Aunt Maggie tell about that, about seeing the train go up. Greenway Hatfield was the sheriff. Of course, he lived down there in what they call Hatfield Bottom, about...just not to far from the end of the bridge. Greenway got out and he rounded up every bad hat he could find in the country--and everything that thought it was bad--and Maggie said, at that time they lived down there beside the tunnel, and Maggie said she'd remembered seeing the train go up with all th...she knew a whole lot of men that were on it, hanging on the sides of the passenger cars and what have you. I think he took those special deputies up there and I think they got pai...I know they got paid for it. And they just, those Italians didn't have a chance. Mafia they might have been, but they had never run into bad hillbillies before. As a matter of fact, I will put bad hillbillies up against anything.

B: Yeah. One thing before I get to far away from this time period, could you tell me the story that you told off tape about Bob Buskirk and his bulldog?

MH: It was said...Bob Buskirk had a number of business interests. Bob was the one that when Kentucky voted...he put his saloon on a flatboat. When Kentucky voted dry, he moved it over and tied it to the West Virginia bank. When Kentucky went wet, and West Virginia went dry, he took it over to the Kentucky bank. When both of 'em went dry he put it in the middle of the river, and that's what they said. But, anyway, he was involved in politics and it was said that Bob registered his bulldog and voted it.

B: About what time period was that, do you know? Turn of the century?

MH: That was before War World I. But, they also said that Greenway Hatfield used to load and old big Packard turn car up with blacks--because alot of people couldn't tell one from the other-- and of course he loved it, because he got paid every time they voted. He'd load 'em in every precinct from Borderland to Thacker; and if you've ever seen an old big packard turn car it would hold quiet a few folks.

B: Yeah. What other stories do you know about Greenway Hatfield he seems to be emerging in our history as a character?

MH: Greenway Hatfield was a character. Greenway was Devil Anse Hatfield's nephew, his father was Wice Hatfield...and his mother was a Chafin. His mother...His father and Devil Anse were brothers; his mother and Devil Anse's wife were sisters. Now, Greenway was also a brother to the governor, Henry D. but...Greenway apparently was...he almost invented political corruption. Very close. At one time--well, I could even get stretches as far as, say, the Hatfield family did--at one time, Greenway was sheriff in Mingo County, and he had it set up when he wasn't sheriff, he had two sons, Willard and Wirt, and they traded it around, because sheriff couldn't succeed himself at that time. Then, over in Logan County, Devil Anse had two sons, Tennis and Joe, and they traded it backwards and forwards. And, up in McDowell County, there was Bill and McGinnis Hatfield, who were cousins to the aforenamed, they traded it backwards and forwards. So, those three counties were controlled by the Hatfield family, and they did pretty much...Now those Hatfield's over in Logan County are the ones that are supposed to have voted mules, registered two mules, and those mules--ungrateful animals that they were--voted Republican. They had no sense of national symbolism, but...That's what you get for votin' a mule.

B: If you don't mind we'll, uh...we'll go to War World I. Is there anything that stands out in your mind that people told you about War World I and the people from this area?

MH: The only thing that really stands out about the War World I business, was the fact they had national or regular Army in here, guards on the tunnel, because they were afraid of German saboteurs, and I used to think how silly that was. But this tunnel down here, the Hatfield tunnel, if somebody took that tunnel out, you have closed coal fields; you have effectively closed the biggest part of the coal fields shipping, especially anything going northward to Pittsburgh--the steel mills up north--and coming out of, well, coming out of the Pond Creek fields, and that area through there going east...If you can take that tunnel and those bridges down, you've put the...

B: So, there was real fear in this area of German sabotage?

MH: Yeah, oh yeah, and, as I said, it took me a long time to figure out...to think that they weren't just paranoid.

B: How about the influenza epidemic?

MH: From what I understand about the influenza epidemic, there was so many sick people they didn't have enough to bury the dead. I mean, you sort of had to wait your turn for somebody to get around and...get around and bury you. And, now, I...My family didn't loose anybody from that, for the very simple reason they stayed out of crowds. They stayed home and they followed the rules, you know, well...I guess they were printed in the newspaper. Maybe they just figured it out themselves. One of my aunts, at that time, was a registered nurse, and she may have had something to do with it. And...But they said that people died(...so many of them, that the doctors couldn't get around to them, the doctors was sick themselves. And they died so fast they couldn't get them buried. But now I've also heard that told before the influenza epidemic I heard them tell about the small pox epidemic.)

B: This is tape two of the Margaret Hatfield interview, July 28, 1989, and when tape one cut off we were talking about the influenza epidemic. You were saying your Aunt Maggie told you...

MH: About epidem...about diphtheria, and typhoid, and small pox epidemics and, apparently, the last small pox epidemic...She was born in 1891, and it would have been in the early 1900's--she was a teenager when a small pox epidemic came through--because she said they built a pest house out there on the...evidently on the rock marrow where the creek goes in the river must have been the...where they did everything. But, they built a pest house out there on that rock marrow for the victims of uh...for the people who were suffering from it, and tried to keep it from spreading. Then, after that, they came through, and I guess...There was a doctor named Dr. Burgess, Tom Dick Burgess, and I guess he was the one that got the vaccine, and got around and vaccinated everybody that he could catch and make hold still long enough. And, of course, after they had seen what happened, they knew what small pox would do to you. But, typhoid went around until...Lord how mercy, it went around 'til DDT came out...'til people started being more particular about the water supplies. And typhoid...Diphtheria... there's... you'll see over in the cemetery at Buskirk, or any big old cemetery like that, all kinds of small graves--babies and small children--and they're dated the same year, and usually they can...You can figure that it was a diphtheria epidemic that did that, because other childhood diseases like measles, chicken pox, stuff like that, they don't kill kids.

B: Did you ever hear about Dr. Goins dying during the flu epidemic? I've had one person say...

MH: Dr. Goins. Yeah, there was a Dr. Goins, and yes he did die of...I guess of over-workin' and the flu.

B: If you don't mind, I'll go ahead while the tape is fresh and start in with questions about the Matewan Massacre and the coal mining wars. Margaret told me that your aunt witnessed the Matewan shoot out?

MH: She did.

B: What did she tell you?

MH: Well, she was upstairs in the Nowlin Building--which that building, the original name of it was Coleman Building, it was built by a Dr. Coleman--and she was a senior in high school, she had...Well, it was at the end of school. She'd been at school that morning, they evidently let out early, and she came down...Her sister lived in an apartment up over the, up over...I think the drug store was on the first floor because her sister's husband was a pharmacist, and she had seen 'em up through the--old Stoney Mountain camp, part of it was behind those houses behind the old high school building--she had seen 'em up through there settin', you know, moving people out and messin' around. So, she gets out, and she's hangin' out one of these windows, and she looked and saw all that army coming down from...marching down from Red Jacket and that area. Now, there wasn't any underpass out there--and this building here, I guess, wasn't here either, the old theater building--and you could see all the way up through there, and she saw 'em coming down through there. She said they were just coming down through there, it wasn't disorderly or anything like that, and then somebody fired a shot, Cable Testerman dropped dead, and that's when...She said the detectives come out of the hotel and was goin' across the street up, you know, up those steps to the trains. She said they were not armed, their guns were taken, and she said if they were armed she didn't...you know, their guns were in their suitcases. And that shot was fired, and they started shootin,' and those men were shot down.

B: Did she ever say who she thought fired the first shot?

MH: Yes.

B: Who was it?

MH: I'm not going to tell ya.

B: Okay.

MH: She didn't say who she thought, she said who she saw. But she had to leave here for a while after that.

B: Oh, really?

MH: Yeah, she knew too much.

B: When did she come back?

MH: Oh, a couple of years later. Of course, I think she was going to leave anyway.

B: These, uh...Did any of your relatives...I'm going to list off a group of names, and then, if your relatives ever told you stories about 'em, I'd be interested to see what they said. Uh...say, Charlie Kiser?

MH: I knew Charlie Kiser.

B: What was he like?

MH: Just a ordinary man. Charlie was a UMWA official, that's Pauline Robertson father, and he's got a sister that lives up North Matewan, Stella Presley. Charlie was like anybody else. I knew his wife alot better than I did him, or his first wife rather, pardon me.

B: Was he uh...Have you heard stories about whether or not he was the instrumental person in gettin' the idea of a union going?

MH: He may have been, he may well have been. I don't know that for a fact, but he may be very well have been, because Charlie was a little better educated than average for miners at that time. So, it very likely was.

B: What about Reece Chambers?

MH: I remember Uncle Reece. Reece Chambers died when I was a little bitty kid, and, well, I believe they finally took him to Huntington Mental Institution. Reece was a tough old cookie, and, after all that was over, he never quite got over the idea that those detectives were going to come back and get him; because, they got Ed Chambers, and they got Sid Hatfield, and he...Last few years of his life I don't think he'd out in daylight. He lived down there in that old house in the back alley, behind the Dr. Whitt house, and he wouldn't go out in the daylight. He was very furative about his movements, he was sincerely convinced...Of course, I have a feeling, that the Felts brothers gave him...They "paranoided" him up a little bit.

B: We've heard stories that he probably killed more of the agents than anyone else.

MH: That is probably true, from what I've heard. At least three of 'em.

B: How about Ed Chambers?

MH: Ed Chambers was about eighteen, or nineteen, twenty years old. He was young, he was sort of caught up in something that, had he been a little older, he might have been more moderate. That's what I've heard.

B: I've had one person actually say that he believed that Ed Chambers was not around during the shooting. Did anyone ever say that to you?

MH: It's possible that he wasn't, but he probably was, because his dad was around, old man Jim Chambers. Uncle Jim was definitely around and Ed probably was too.

B: One of the things that we've been wondering about, my colleague and I, is that it seems--unless there was an earlier monument that disappeared--that Ed received...he had a monument over his grave before Sid did. Was that..?

MH: Oh, yeah. That's been there as long as I can remember, his family put that up. I guess Aunt Martha Chambers, his mother, paid for that, I suppose.

B: We were just wondering if that was perhaps a sign that maybe Ed was better like in the community than Sid?

MH: Sid Hatfield was not liked at all in the community.

B: Why was that?

MH: Sid was a bully, Sid was an outlaw. Sid sold his gun.

B: Oh, really.

MH: I was always told that he offered it to coal companies first, and they didn't want it so...And another thing--you will find this in Virgil Carrington Jones's book about the Hatfield and McCoy Feud--Sid was not a Hatfield. Sid was an illegitimate child, he was a Crabtree, he went by the name of Hatfield.

B: Was that something that was known around here?

MH: Everybody knew it. Everybody knew, that was no well kept secret at all. Everybody knew that.

B: Who was his father?

MH: Well, it was my understanding that it was a boarder, a boarder that stayed with--I think his father's name was Joe Hatfield or Jay one or the other--stayed with him and his wife, and she got too friendly with the boarder. That's what my grandma said, that's the way my grandma put it. Real friendly.

B: What kind of talk did the older people make about the situation with Sid, and Jessie, and Cable Testerman?

MH: Well, now don't it strike you as strange that three days later she--three or four days later--she married him? I mean does that not come to you as being a bit hasty?

B: A little bit.

MH: I mean what are you supposed to think about it?

B: Have you ever...We've had a hard time uncovering any information on Testerman's first wife. I've heard that her name is Lou, but no one seems to remember what happened to her.

MH: I don't know what went with her either, I never heard of her. I never really knew what went with Ed Chamber's wife either. I know who she was, she was a Starr from up at Blackberry City, and I don't know what became of her. I know she married one of the lawyers, one of the labor lawyers, that didn't work out, and I don't know where she went. But now I know where Mrs. Testerman went. Cable Testerman had a son, they had a son and...My Aunt Cynthia died in 1982, and it was before she died she was readin' the paper one night, and she said, "I would have thought that 'lady' would have been dead years ago." And I said, "Who are you talking about?" And it was Mrs. Testerman and she lived over at Lenore with her son. I don't know where they buried her, they didn't bury her between Testerman and Sid. I thought she had right smart of nerve to bury two husbands side by side.

B: Was that her decision?

MH: I'm sure it was.

B: We've run...Some of the older interviews, that people have passed through this area and conducted, said that Jessie had a bad reputation around town.

MH: She did.

B: Was she considered loose or...

MH: She had a very...people thought very hard of her indeed. There were people who thought the Matewan Massacre would have never occurred if it hadn't been for her; because there were people who were of the opinion that Sid Hatfield killed Cable Testerman to get Cable's wife and that when miners heard the shot that he fired and killed Cable Testerman--over there through that building across the street--when they heard that shot, they thought the detectives were firing on somebody, and that's what set it off. Now ole Jessie Testerman was not a beloved character.

B: Okay.

MH: If you saw the street laying full of dead bodies then you'd understand why people did not think well of...

B: Right.

MH: As a matter of fact, I heard my aunt--when she read that obituary--she called her something that I never heard her call somebody before.

B: Right out strong feelings.

MH: Yeah. And, as I said, she was here...she saw her. And then plus the fact of marrying three days afterwards.

B: How about some of the...I know this is probably more on the preriffery, but some of outside union organizers, we've been piecing together little stories about them. Say, Bill Blizzard, did you..?

MH: I've never heard anything about him, I've never heard anything about him. I'll tell you one thing that did strike a bell with me, and I discussed it with my dad, we laughed about it after we found out. In the movie "Matewan," there was a Black man named Ples Few-clothes, who was one of the leading organizers. And, now, I am sure there could not have been two black men in the world named that, but in the '20's and '30's and I think--well, daddy said in the '20's and '30's--Ples Fewclothes used to wonder back in here every once in a while and he worked that farm, he worked for my grandma down there on the farm, and he was always very careful about where he went, and where he was seen, and what have you. But, he did come back in and out of here and nobody, well, daddy said he always thought Ples was wanted by the law, or, you know, he was on the dodge for something and he may have had a family, or some interest, that he came back here every once in a while to check on, but he was supposed to been a very nice man and a very good worker.

B: We've heard that he was incorporated into the movie, though he wasn't in this exact area; that he was in a county near here.

MH: Now that could have been, but now he was...Ples Fewclothes came through here.

B: Okay.

MH: Of course, now that my dad's...Well, my uncle might remember.

B: I'll have to check on that. How about Mother Jones?

MH: I don't think...I don't know if she was ever here. If she was, I never heard of it. She was over at Cabin Creek, and that was in the earlier strikes...that would have been like 1916 when Henry D. Hatfield was governor. I don't think she was ever right here, in Williamson, or Matewan, or right in this immmediate [sic] area. If she was, I don't remember. I've never heard of it.

B: Getting into the era called the coal mining wars, I know we've mentioned him off tape, so, I'll ask you...What have you heard about Don Chafin?

MH: Well, Don Chafin was a tough customer. Now, I have heard it told that he had a machine gun that he wanted to test, so, he turned some black people loose out of Logan County jail and tested it. I don't know if that's true, that may just be a...There's alot of tales told that...There are bear tales, "b,e,a,r" tales, and there are bare tales, "b,a,r,e" tales, and that may be a "b,a,r,e" tale. So, I don't know if that's true or not. But, he was supposed to have been a...more like a dictator than anything else. You did what he wanted done, or you wished you had.

B: How about the Captain Brockus, I believe, or perhaps it was Major Brockus, that headed the state police thing?

MH: I don't know anything about him. I've heard of a state police named Lively who came in here--he was a state police detective is what he was--and there were others, but Brockus I don't know that much about. I've heard the name.

B: Could you be meaning the C.E. Lively that was the Baldwin-Felts operative.

MH: He was supposed to have been with the state police, too. That's what I've always heard.

B: One thing...When I've been interviewing the people that were small children that lived in the tent colonies, they said that the state police and the Baldwin-Felts agents, both, would raid the tent colonies; that they worked together.

MH: Well, certainly. The coal companies controlled politics. The coal companies controlled everything; they controlled the school system, they controlled the whole nine yards, so, of course, the state police would do it.

B: There's one story that was told to my colleague, that your aunt may have mentioned, we've heard the story that Albert Burgraff played the organ, and that when was school was letting out about the time that the shooting started, he took the children into the church and played the organ and they sang songs while the shooting was going on. Did you ever hear that?

MH: Could very well have been. Yeah.

B: What kind of stories did you hear growing up about Babe Burgraff, his sister. Her name was Elizabeth, I believe, she was about six feet tall.

MH: I have heard of her and right now I can't pin definite stories to her. I'm trying to think...There's so many of 'em, they're going through my mind forty miles an hour.

B: We cut the tape off to have a short break. I've been asking Mrs. Hatfield about some of the buildings around town and, uh...

MH: ...and their occupants.

B: And their occupants. And what do you believe was used as a mayor's office after Testerman's death?

MH: Probably, they did the town business out the back room of the drug store when George Wagoner was mayor and just, you know, whereever. They used to do it out of Cooper Hardware when Harry Cooper was mayor. I don't think they really had a city hall, as such, for a long time.

B: How about the jail?

MH: Well, now the old jail was behind the railroad tracks, over there behind the where the depot stood, and I guess that old building is still over there. It said "Lock-up" on the front of it. I don't know when they moved it out here on the river bank.

B: One of the pictures that we have is of an old Western Union office that was down at the lower end of town, did you..?

MH: That old Western Union office, I think, was down...There was a couple of buildings torn down when they built that parking lot between the bank and the Baptist Church, and I think that's where that Western Union office was.

B: See, I remember you saying off tape that you think your Uncle Dewey had one of the first cars in town.

MH: He had one of the very early ones. I think they said somebody named--I believe his name was Taylor Hatfield---brought the first one to town, and, I don't know, Dewey may have bought that car off of Taylor. But, it was a Buick...It was a Buick Turn Car, and that would have been in the very early '20's; '21, '22, somewhere along in there.

B: Okay. One of the things that we're interested in following is development of transportation, how transportation came through this area. Do you know much about the history of, say, the bridge? How did people cross over from Matewan to Kentucky?

MH: You mean the automobile bridge?

B: Uh huh.

MH: That bridge wasn't put there 'til after War World II. Now, prior to that, there used to be an old swingin' bridge up there at the Blue Goose saloon, and it was like most swingin' bridges; pretty ricketty concern. Then there was a bridge up at McCarr, which was a coal company bridge, and they ran coal cars across the top of it, on the railroad on the West Virginia side. But, now there was no bridge at Matewan until after War World II, and they bought that...the old bridge--the one that went out in the '77 flood--they bought it off of Puritan Mining Company, down at Sprigg. It was the old PMC bridge, and they moved it up here, that's how Buskirk got its bridge; about '45, or '46, somewhere along in there.

B: One thing that I'll ask you, while I've got it on my mind, is what kind of, say, superstitions or wives tales that have come out...that--we would call it local color--what kind of things did, say, the old timey women believe? As far as superstitions?

MH: Well, now it depended on who were talking to. There's some of 'em believed in almost anything. I know one thing that used to just absolutely--and, especially, by the time I got in high school and had enough science to know better, and I'd say there are still quite a few of 'em runnin' around that believes this--they believed you could mark a baby, an unborn baby. And I remember one child in particular that, well, the child was obviously Down's Syndrome, and with complications thereof, and--I was teaching school--and the lady insisted what was wrong with that child was it had been marked with a groundhog. The idea of being...that the mother, at a certain time in pregnancy, had seen a groundhog, been frighten by a groundhog and caused the child to come out lookin' like that. And I've heard all kinds of tales about markin' 'em with...Anytime a child was born with a birthmark on it anywhere, that's was where its mother seen somebody with a cut on 'em and grabbed herself and... That was one of the most, more ridiculous ones that I can think of.

B: One that I've been asked by some of the older ladies when I go to visit them is am I superstitious about going the same way out that I came in.

MH: Oh, yeah, I've always heard...Well, some people believe that you're supposed to go out by the same door that you came in, or its bad luck. Other people...I've heard people say not to go out the same door you came in, sort of catch you coming and going.

B: I guess...Gettin' back to the schedule, uh...what have...What do you know about the founding of the hospital that was here in Matewan?

MH: It was put here in the early '20's. Dr. Hodge came here after War World I, and it was put here in the early '20's. It went out, oh...in the early '50's. Doc Hodge retired and went to Florida and he died down there a few years later, and after that...the hospital--or after Doc Hodge left the hospital--nobody ever reopened it. Well, shortly after that, the big--what's now the ARH--the miner's hospital opened in Williamson. They're just wasn't any need for it.

B: So, what kind of things would they do for people at that hospital? What would they treat?

MH: Anything.

B: So, there wasn't anything like...past a certain point of seriousness, that they would send 'em on somewhere else..?

MH: Bone surgery, and things like that, they usually put 'em on the train and sent 'em to Welch or to Huntington and...or sometimes they would send 'em to John Hopkins in Baltimore. But most ordinary, like 'pendicitis, anything from 'pendicitis on down, they did it here.

B: Okay.

MH: What I remember about that hospital is having my tonsils removed, when I was about four years old.

B: Do you remember how they did it?

MH: No, because they put me out. But I do remember they used to have a regular tonsils' day. I mean, every kid that they could catch that still had tonsils they'd take 'em in and remove their tonsils. As a result, I've never had more than two strep throats in my life, and people with tonsils have 'em all the time. So, that makes me wonder if they weren't right.

B: Speaking of medicine, one thing that social historians are trying to piece together is women in the coal fields. How did they react toward medicine? Did most people try to take care of themselves or would they go to doctors?

MH: Well, now, it varied from place to place, and people to people. If they lived in the coal camps where they had the company doctor--it was available, it was cheap--they went. But an awful lot of people...and that's why alot of the older people are still scared to death of hospitals, because they didn't go to the...'til they was ready to die. I mean there was no such thing...They didn't do preventive medicine...they didn't...Now, that's come around alot in the last so many years. Of course, when I was growing up you didn't play sick, because my grandmother had the first miracle drug, the first wonder drug. It was called castor oil.

B: Oh, no.

MH: And she had a big cookin' spoon, and if you said, "I'm too sick to go to school or Sunday school," out come the castor oil and the cookin' spoon. And if you didn't have a broken leg, you took off runnin.' And if...you know, there was something castor oil, obviously, wouldn't get to, and we're still sick, and, "Just as soon as your daddy comes home, you're going to the doctor." Well, now, there was only one thing the doctor was going do to you and that was give you a shot. So, you'd be surprised how few sick kids there were. That was the "instant cure" from Blangdrum.

B: Okay.

MH: And all medicine was supposed to taste bad; if it didn't burn, stink, or taste bad, it wutn't do you any good.

B: (Laughing)

MH: Now, there was one old wive's tale...I've never--now, I've heard other people tell about it--I never had this done to me. My grandma was one of these clean fanatics, but to break out--now, measles, and stuff like that, if you put a kid in bed, cover him up, and pour hot drinks down him, he's going to break out. However, they had an idea that there was some secret ingredient in sheep manure, which they took and boiled and made tea out of, and they spooned down the sick kid. If he wutn't already sick enough, he was gonna be when he realized what was happening and that was supposed to be...Usually the kid...If the kid wutn't deadly sick when he heard what they was going to do him, he took out the door in his night shirt, headin' for Texas to be an outlaw, but, otherwise, they'd have to worm him out from under the bed and get him down and pour that down him. If that didn't kill him, he was going suffer the disgrace at school; somebody was going to go to school and tell what they done to him. Now, they did doctor with that stuff, and I don't...

B: Tea made out of sheep manure?

MH: Yes, ma'am.

B: Okay. Now, I've heard of, uh...a remedy for a toe itch, about making children go and stand in fresh cow manure. Did you ever hear of that?

MH: I've known kids that did it accidentally, but not on purpose.

B: How about with, uh...with pregnancy? It seems that the women that I've interviewed from the 1920's, and, say, '30's, that was a real transitional time as to whether or not women had their children at home, or in a hospital with a midwife or a doctor. What do you know about the old way of doing things?

MH: Most doctors until the mid-'50's made house calls, and so if they had 'em at home...the doctor would come.

B: We were talking about pregnancy.

MH: I thought those midwifes had to be tremendously skilled, with the number of mothers they didn't lose, and for the number of babies they didn't lose.

B: Do you think about the mid-1950's was when things really changed as far as..?

MH: Well, I'll tell you, I'll tell you what really did it was the early 50's and the UMWA card; United Mine Workers hospital card. And then they could go to the hospital for...you know, it didn't cost anything atall, and that's what I think really did it more than anything else.

B: You mentioned before the Rural Electrification. Do you have any idea how far back Matewan propers say this downtown area had electricity? We've heard much earlier...

MH: Oh, Lord, yes, because they brought...You see, there's a power...the big power station at Sprigg, well, they brought the power across the mountain, down there at the tunnel from that, to take it to the mines at Red Jacket, and up that away. So, Matewan, Matewan got power, oh, 1920, I'm sure, or before...When the mines started openin' up in there, they...Matewan was electrified. Matewan didn't get street lights 'til I was a grown woman. Of course, there wasn't anything...We used to walk from the high school from down the lower end of town--Aunt Lucy Hoskins lived down the lower end of town I grew up with one of her granddaughters--and we used to...we thought nothing of walking from down there to the Matewan High School gym up in the upper end of town; after dark, coming through the under...They wutn't nothing going to get--well they wutn't anything that'd have us, but...

B: Well, we've heard said that it was a safe town as far...

MH: It was safe.

B: ...as children were concerned.

MH: Nobody, well, if anybody bothered the kids you got killed; I mean, that would've been the end of you right there. A child molester wouldn't last as long as a "snowball in hell." They just took that one out and done what was supposed to be done with it. I guess that I was, I'm sure I was eighteen years old, before I knew what a "queer" was.

B: Hmm!

MH: That's no joke. Or any other kind of pervert. Oh, ever once in a while somebody...we'd have a flasher, but usually it was some poor old drunk that didn't know what he was doing. But as far as real "perverty," get-down-dirty people, we didn't have 'em. You got killed for actin' like that in Matewan.

B: Let's see, so, uh...where did you go to school, startin' out? Did you go all the way...through here?

MH: Well, the first years that I went to school...When I was-- before I turned six years old--I had rheumatic fever, and they didn't know whether I was going to get to start school that year or not, so, I went to school with my Aunt Cynthia and she taught down there...There was a coal camp down there where the new high school is, New Howard, Sirossa?, and she taught down there and the first couple of years that I went to school, I went down there; from then on, I went to Matewan. All the way. See, used to be, the people that lived over in Buskirk, and that area, they didn't run the Belfry buses down to there, and, as a result, Pike County paid Mingo County to let the kids from over in there go to school to prevent the expense of having to run buses. It wouldn't be a bad idea now. They could save themselves alot of money. That's why we got to go to school in Matewan.

B: Then, after high school, where did you go to college?

MH: I went one year to Pikeville, but mostly to Marshall, the "University of Southern West Virginia."

B: (Laughing) Then...Did you become a teacher after that?

MH: Yelp.

B: Okay.

MH: Then I went back and got a master's from 'em, from Marshall. I did a little...I started out to do some doctorial work at WVU, and then my health got bad and I had to quit. Had to give it up. And, besides, I hate Morgantown.

B: (Laughing)

MH: Who doesn't?

B: (Laughing) That's true. When you were teaching...You taught in Matewan, did you not? MH: I taught for a while in Matewan. I taught at Red Jacket Junior High. I taught at Burch, at Delbarton.

B: Now, we've heard, in the old days, that Billy Adair--or Billy A-dair, however you like to say that--.

MH: Billy A-dair? Yelp.

B: ...ran...uh...he had a kind of a racket going with the teachers.

MH: He did, he did, he did, girl.

B: Could you tell me something about that?

MH: It wutn't just Billy Adair, it was...he had company. No pay, no job, you literally bought your school. And they came around collectin,' they called it "campaign funds," to make sure they got re-elected next time. And you paid up or you...Well, if they couldn't get around hiring you--they had to hire you--if you lived at Matewan they'd send you to Dingess, or, you know, some real strange place like that. Oh, yes, that was...

B: Was that still around when you began teaching?

MH: I heard tales of it, but I never experienced it. To my knowledge during the time that Herschel Morgan was superintendent that was never done. Now, there were tales, but I don't believe 'em.

B: Okay. So, you probably started teaching in the '60's?

MH: '64, 1964, at Red Jacket.

B: Of the 1960's...I think if people read anything about Mingo County, they read Huey Perry's book, "They'll Take Your Project," did you ever..?

MH: They should have taken him.

B: Did you know Huey Perry?

MH: Yes. I strongly object to the mentality that poverty projects bought to this area. These people were...they were proud people --now they were poor but they were proud--and they would make their own way. And the so-called "poverty projects," to me, brought a welfare mentality, or Indian Reservation mentality, and "gi'me, gi'me, gi'me," whether I do or not. And instead of imbuing pride in 'em, let's prove that they're wrong, and here: "You're supposed to do for me, you know, not because I'm the best, or...because I'm a poor Appalachian white." "I'm a poor ignorant hillbilly and they'll," you know...Just like, "I'm supposed to have this job because I'm black," or "I don't think any slack should be cut for anybody because of anything," and that's the way things used to. Be...I mean...I don't think anybody should be done out of anything because they're black, white, male, female, Vulcanian alien for that matter; but I don't think they should have any slack cut for 'em either, married or alone, and I just don't like the poverty project.

B: So, it wasn't just the politics that got involved with that project it was what the kind of ideas they put in.

MH: Yelp, and I'll tell you another thing to about the politics, alot of politics involved in that project came from "We're the outs..." that, you know, "We're out so were the good guys, but if we get in, the reason we get is so we can do what their doing only it will be us doing it instead of them," which is the way it turned out in alot of cases.

B: One indication that a man said that the effect that the poverty projects had, was about twenty-fives years ago he used to sell baby chickens--more than he could ever count--and people quit providing their own food or growing their own food.

MH: Mmm, hmm.

B: Is that a sign that you also saw in there?

MH: I saw that. And also one--after the welfare project, poverty project--one year some welfare group tried to distribute garden seeds and plants. Nobody come and got 'em. People...you know, don't have to. You don't have to save, you don't to work; one way or another you'll get, by you'll make do. There's...it's a make-do instead of successful attitude. You know a makeshift.

B: What do you remember about Ernest Hatfield? Was he a relative of yours?

MH: Oh, yel, he's Basil's nephew. I've known Ernest all my life.

B: We've heard that he was one of the last police chiefs that had to be able to whip everybody in the county. Was that what police chiefs used to have to be like?

MH: That used to be one of the things, yes. You had to be...I don't know about Ernest whippin' so many people, but you had to be a little bit rougher and tougher than...Well, there used to be an idea around Matewan that you got the meanest man in town and made a law out of him. And they did have one, or two, or three, of those. And...I don't know about Ernest bein' the meanest; he was police chief for quite some time. Let's see, Ernest Hatfield and Ernest Ward...

B: At the beginning of this project I interviewed Grace Hatfield, and one thing she eluded to--but really didn't want to talk about--was the incident between Ernest and Dewey. Would you care to comment on that?

MH: Dewey shot Ernest, that's all there was to it.

B: Do you know what it was over?

MH: Yel, Ernest came in there and showed his hindend...he thought he could buffalo Dewey and he couldn't. That was all there was to it. He admitted that himself in later years. He thought he could whip Dewey and that's what he got for thinkin'. That, I think, happened about 1937-'38, somewhere along that period of time.

B: What do you remember about the theater here in town?

MH: Oh, my goodness. That was where you went on Saturday for fifteen cents. I mean for fifteen cents you'd get rid of your kids all day, because...this is a bargain. And if you gave 'em a quarter, they had enough for popcorn and pop, and not only get rid of 'em, but make themselves sick. Anyway, there was cartoons...previews, cartoons, travel log, short subjects, and then there was two features; a double feature--which was cowboys and Indians and war, or cowboys and Indians and gangsters--usually there was a serial with it too, which might be "Tarzan," "Shena of the Jungle" ...I think it was "Nioaka of the Jungle" at that time, "Shena of the Jungle" came on T.V. And, Lord, I don't know what and all else...That's...the Saturday matinee was where everybody was. You sat in there and scooted down in the seat 'til you were sittin' on your backbone, and you parked your genuine Roy Rogers cowboy boots on the seat back in front of you, and you set there and flipped cinnamon hot drops at people you hated. And hissed the villain, and cheered with the good guy, and just generally had a real good time 'til, oh...Well, now, Naulas McCoy always sold tickets at the theater--that's Matt Allara's sister--Naulas McCoy always sold tickets...Oh, Thelma Jones worked in the theater and...I can't... .Woodrow Hatfield's wife, I can't think of her name. But, they were the ones that always worked in the theater and kept from gettin' too outrageous and rowdy; anybody from killin' anybody. But, now, at night when the adults was there, it was much calmer, more orderly, and what have you, but on Saturdays it was "kiddy day." And this went on 'til after we got our first t.v. in 1952, which was the second or third one that came into Matewan, because my Uncle Dewey had the dealership for Sylvania, and even...after... For a while even after TV's came out, the Saturday matinees were still...

B: ...the thing.

MH: ...the place to be.

B: What do you remember when you were a child, say in the late '40's and early '50's, what were the things to have as a child? Say, toys, or clothes, or candy...

MH: Toys, clothes, candy...Alright, anything that had Roy Rogers on it, don't make no difference what, if it had Roy Rogers on it you wanted it. And candy, well...Now, I remember when Coke Cola's were a nickel and...The things were Coke Cola's and there was a Grapette(?) which was--we're talking about the six ounce size--and an orange Crush, and, of course, 7-up and RC, but 7-up was mostly something they gave you when you were sick. And, ah, the candy... of course Hershey bars, and...Hershey bars were the big thing, Hershey with almonds was a big thing, and a Mounds bar--which always cost a dime--a Mounds Almond Joy--which was always a dime, the others were a nickel--and there used to be a nickel bag of potato chips, too, which, as I remember, were almost the size of those 69 cents Hunger Busters now. A nickel went alot farther than it does...A nickel used to buy two pencils, used to buy a pack of notebook paper--not a great big one, but big enough--and...alot of things were a nickel. (TAPE CUTS OFF)

(NOTE: Ms. Bailey and Ms. Hatfield are reviewing the Walking Tour Brochure distributed by the Matewan Development Center.)

B: One building on there is reversed, they have this building and Nowlin building reversed.

MH: That's on this side of the street. That's one, two, three, four. Alright, that number one...My earliest memory of that was a grocery store run by a man by the name of Sutherland, it was called a supermarket. Now, the next one down, number two, was the lobby of the old Urias Hotel, and that was the drug store. And, I think, as far back as I can remember, next to the drug store, number three, would have been some kind of beer joint.

B: Could it have been the Silver Dollar?

MH: It was. When Bob Buskirk came back here about 1950, he opened it as a the "Silver Dollar," yeah. Okay, number four would have been the liquor store. Now, "Hope's Department Store" used to be on this side of the street, so did "Ibos's," pardon me, "Kirk's." Now here in number five...Well, this whole open area here, let's see after the liquor store would have been "Kirk's Department Store" and then--"Matewan Cafe" has always been where it is--well, there would have been "Kirk's," then "Hope's," then the "Matewan Cafe," and the next one was the theater, and number five was a barber shop. And, I think, as far back as I can remember it, they was all related to me. They were...One of 'em was my mother's brother-in-law, the other one was her first cousin. Muss Stafford and J.I. Blackburn had that number five, in the barber shop.

B: Now, we've heard that there was a Keesee that was a barber.

MH: Landon, he was another first cousin of my mother's.

B: Okay. Can you repeat the names of the two Blackburns?

MH: Muss Stafford, M, u, s, s, and J. I. Blackburn. On the other side of the street...Now, to the to the farthest back of my memory, number six used to be the bank. When I was a little kid there was a bank, and in behind it, facing on the railroad track, was the old post office. Number seven, I think, was Chamber's Hardware. Number eight, Bob Brewer had a store, a grocery store, called the "Food Market," now somewhere or another...that was a little later. Number nine, let's see, beside the "Food Market" was the dry cleaner's, the old "L. O.(?) Stewart Dry Cleaner's," and there was the "Knotty Pine," which was a restaurant, and then "Nenni's." Then...What I guess is eleven here, used to be a beer joint called "The Rainbow Grill." I mean a bad one.

B: Were respectable girls allowed to go?

MH: Like Levities in the Bible, you crossed the street and went down on the other side. Now, let's see, out there in the back alley was the old "Grace Ford Garage," "Grace Ford Sales," behind it was the VFW, the "Fox Hole," and I don't know what and all was down there. Of course, over there in Warm Holler, mouth of Warm Holler, was always was the Methodist Church...And, but the old "B&C Oil," which I call the old "Hatfield Wholesale Building."

B: Is that where Dewey's "Hatfield..?"

MH: That's were Dewey's "Hatfield Wholesale" was. I half-way grew up in that building. And then, of course, there was a depot over there too. Wutn't anything else up in Warm Holler, it was purely residential.

B: We've also heard that there were, down here next to the river, that there was another row of buildings years ago.

MH: There was, down there about were the City Hall is now. Well, that's where "Carey's" stood. That was an old big two-story house, and then just this side of it was the old Alan Ream's building, then "Ream's Wholesale Building," and the jail has always been down there. And there was a bunch of old shacky houses down there, I think mostly...There was a Nigger lived down there, they called him "Dap" I don't know what his real name was. There was three or four colored families that lived down in there, and then "Water Works" was down there, and the old "Mingo Lime & Lumber Lot" was out here at the end, then across on the other side was old Scott Nichol's bus station. I don't think that...Then, of course, up here beyond eleven, where those steps are, going up the railroad track, that used be "Esso Gas Station." And there...well, there at the end of the "Buskirk Building," standing out in the middle of the thing, wase "B&C Oil Texaco Station." They had Ernest Brown on that. Floods took an awful lot of stuff out; and then fire, you know, one thing or another.

B: What do you remember about the flood? What stands up in your mind about the flood?

MH: Which flood?

B: '77.

MH: I was trapped in the top story of that old house down below Matewan. I was trapped in there for about forty-eight hours. There was as much water runnin' behind it as there was runnin' in front of it, and I had my two aunts in there with me. One of 'em was 86 and the other one was 77, and the one who was 86 was blind. I don't like to even talk about it. I may be the only person you'll ever talk to that don't want to talk about the '77 flood. (Laughing)

B: What kind of, uh...We've found out since, that was not the only flood that came through Matewan. How did that...Is there uh... almost a flood mentality around here that people just keep going back and rebuilding and stuff?

MH: There must be. I have always said...Now, when the '77 flood ...Of course, the seventy-seven flood went places that floods had never been before. I always said that...We left here after the '77 flood. I said, "One flood, per customer, per life time was enough for me," but I have always said there are two categories of people in the world that I do not feel sorry for: the people in the flooded Matewan, and the starving people in India who have cows runnin' around that they don't eat or milk, and they got an ocean full of seafood that they won't eat. They set there and they starve. And the people in Matewan who keep going back and rebuilding to get it warshed off again next year. There is a flood mentality. I never could understand it.

B: I had one person say that the '77 flood was a hundred year flood; that many years ago there were floods that were almost as bad. That it's a cycle, that this type of flood is part of a cycle?

MH: Well, if that is the next one come on'll be forty days and nights. Well, now I'll tell you something, I don't think it's part of a cycle, and I don't think that there had been one that bad before. When you've cut every stick of timber off these mountain sides, everything bigger than my fourth finger, and strip the mountains, there's nothing to hold the water and that water is going to go somewhere. And when you built lots, and filled up the river bed, and...you know, that water is going to go somewhere. It has to.

B: So, it was poor planning? It was as much of...

MH: It was poor planning and I'll never be convinced of anything other than that fact. In 1977, mine water broke loose from somewhere--old mine works broke loose from somewhere--cause I been seeing flood water all my life and that's the first time I ever saw it go down through Matewan yeller and muddy as a clay hole. Flood water is tattletale gray, and that was coming from behind fresh dirt somewhere. Now, they said it wasn't and they can say what they want to.

B: Was there anything that you would like to talk about that I haven't ask you today?

MH: Not I can think of.

B: Well, thank you for talking to me today.

MH: Yes, ma'am.

Matewan Oral History Project Collection