A pre-feud murder
The first known conflict between the families started in the aftermath of the Civil War. Members of the Logan Wildcats, a group of Confederate soldiers in West Virginia led by Devil Anse, murdered Ole Ran’l McCoy’s brother Asa Harmon. During the Civil War, Harmon had served in the Union Army, with the Kentucky home guard. The Home Guard were suspected of spying and stealing horses that belonged to the Logan Wildcats. Harmon mustered out of the army in December 1864. The Wilcats quickly targeted Harmon for his Union sympathies, tracked him, and shot him in January of 1865. This type of murder, “bushwhacking,” wasn’t uncommon, with Confederate sympathizers harassing, stealing from, or injuring their Union-leaning neighbors. Nobody was prosecuted for the murder. Harmon’s murder was more related to his Union sympathies than his McCoy connections, and many historians consider the incident unrelated to the feud.