During the US Civil War a man by the name of Asa Harmon McCoy joined the Nothern Union Army, as he lived in the Southern states many people in his home county felt this made him a traitor to his hometown. In 1865 he left the army and returned home, soon after, he was shot and killed by a local group of men led by Vance Hatfield because of his choice to join the Northern army.

Thirteen years later a pig was found on the Hatfield farm, however the McCoy’s claimed the markings on the pig showed it was actually their pig. The two families took the matter to the courts and a relative of both families, Bill Staton, went to the court and said the pig truly belonged to the Hatfield family. Two years later, in 1880, two of the McCoy men shot and killed Bill Staton but were let free because the court said it was in self-defense.

Later that year, Roseanna McCoy started a relationship with Johnse Hatfield, one day when Johnse went to visit Roseanna, the McCoy family arrest him on an old crime of illegally making alcohol without a license. Roseanna went to the Hatfield family and told them what happened and the Hatfield family quickly surrounded the McCoy home and demanded Johnse’s release. Johnse was released the day before he was suppose to be taken to court for his crimes. After her help, Johnse repaid Roseanna terribly by leaving her while she was pregnant and marrying her cousin, Nancy McCoy.

In 1882, Ellison Hatfield, uncle of Johnse, was stabbed 26 times and then shot by three of Roseanna McCoy’s brothers. The brothers were arrested by the Hatfield family police officers and held in waiting to see what the fate of Ellison would be. When Ellison finally died of his injuries the three McCoy bothers were tied to bushes and repeated shot by the Hatfield family.

Between 1880 to 1891 the problems between these two families took the life of more than a dozen of the family members and caused massive media attention all around the USA. On New Years Eve in 1888 the fued between the families reach it’s worst when several of the Hatfield family surrounded the McCoy family home while they were sleeping and fired repeatedly into the house. They then lit the house on fire in order to try and force the family father, Randal McCoy, out into the open. Randal escaped the fire and got away but two of his children were murdered and his wife was severly beaten and left for dead.

After the New Years Eve massacre the local people gathered together and formed a group which went out and arrested the leader of the Hatfield family and 8 others, they were all eventually tried and found guilty of murdering Randal’s wife and one was hung for his crimes, the others received life sentences.

After this trial, the two families came together and declared an end to the fued, it had taken the lives of over 20 of their family members and neither side gained anything from it, all over the ownership of a pig.

In a fued, emotions run wild and people are willing to do incredibly cruel or terrible things they would normally never be willing to do, they often forget the start of the fued and instead only focus on the last act of cruelty, never willing to put aside emotions and look at things rationally. Countries are like large families, we help each other and support each other, but we shouldn’t allow past fueds and problems to cause us to destroy the future of our families. Those 20 members of the Hatfields and McCoys were killed because of a pig, these men and women could have helped their family rise in life and do great things, instead their lives were wasted in the name of pride and face.

In 1891 the two families realized how damaging their hatred and anger had become and put aside their long years of anger and the murders of their relatives. This act of forgiveness, not forgetfulness, just forgiveness, allowed these two families to later give birth to a famous Police Chief, a Washington state Senator, a Famous singer song writer and a world famous Trumpet player.

Divided by anger and hate because of past problems, the world is like the lives of the Hatfields and McCoys, angry, hateful, dangerous and full of murder. Countries who want a peaceful and happy future must forgive the past actions of others. Everyone knows the saying, those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it, and no one would ever suggest we should forget the past, but we must, as a species, learn to forgive the past.

Israel and Palestine, USA and Russia, England and France, China and Japan, India and Pakistan. The world is full of conflicts that look a lot like the Hatfield and McCoy family fued, the real origins of these fueds are mostly lost in history, or at least not often thought of, all people focus on is the last act of aggression. It is up to all of us, as citizens of these countries, to forgive those who came before us. Let the angers and hatreds of our ancestors die, otherwise the future will only exist to continue the cycle of death and anger and our children will suffer all their lives for our hatreds.