Addendum on Ellison Hatfield

As for my ancestor, Ellison Hatfield, and his military service, I kept finding statements that led me to think he had departed from Gettysburg after Pickett's Charge (Ellison was a Confederate lieutenant and had his own command) and gone home to fight no more. Well, after some research I got to the bottom of the story. He went home after the fight, alright. But only after accompanying General Lee to Appomatox Courthouse to witness Lee's surrender to Grant. At that point he surrendered his command, packed his things and came home to Mingo County, a decorated hero.

So there's the newest reason I can claim to be a Hatfield...we aren't quitters and never back down from a fight, always loyal to the cause we believe in. Before anyone jumps on the "you're a Johnny Reb southerner, blah blah blah..." Yep, I am. By birth. But my fight would have been staked on the fight for state's rights, and never slavery, which I abhor. My favorite scene in the movie "Gettysburg" is Jeff Daniels, as Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, asking a Confederate prioner why he was fighting even when all seemed lost. "I don't know about other folk...I'm fattin' for my rats. All of us here, that's what we're fattin' for." "Your what?" "For our rats. The rat to live my life like I see fit. Why can't you just live the way you want to live, and let us live the way we do? Live and let live, I hear some folks say. Be lot less fuss and bother if more folks took it to heart"

Yep, I'm a Hatfield because Hatfields fought to preserve the rights they believed proper and good. The right of local municipalities and state governments to govern themselves with the cooperation and not the interference of the federal government. But that argument will wait for another day...'cause I'm a Hatfied. And you aren't.

The Main Reason I am a Hatfield, and you aren't...

Well, I was born a Hatfield. My Dad was a Hatfield, from Mingo County WV. So unless you, too, were born into the Hatfield family like I was...you aren't a Hatfield.

The real reason I figure it's time for this blog is to air out my closet of family laundry. It all revolves around my relationship with my father, which was not always the best until just before he died in October of 2010. But I was able to spend nearly every day with him the four weeks prior to his passing, and in that short time we healed some very old wounds and finally found a little common ground before he was gone. We also spent a good amount of time talking about the Hatfields and our branch of the family. I spent some time and money on line and we discovered he had been mistaken about part of the course of descent in his Dad's family.

Dad always thought that one his great-great-great-grandfather had been an uncle to Anderson "Devil" Anse, family patriarch through the years of the feud with the McCoys. But he was wrong, and we discovered that his great-grandfather was actually Ellison Hatfield, a younger brother to Devil Anse. And when you search feud history you find that Ellison was attacked on Election Day, August 7, 1882, by three McCoys. He died 48 hour later, and that sparked retribution by Anse that caused the feud to escalate to its historic proportions.

It's really odd and thought-provoking how life transpires. My Dad was born August 6th, 1934, and would have turned 77 yesterday had he lived on. But to think about the fact his great-grandfather was for all intents murdered on August 7th is the kind of thing that typically becomes Hatfield lore. Which fits my Dad. He grew up on Tug River, right on the WV/KY border, on a little farm situated just on the WV side of the river, sandwiched between the Norfolk and Western Railroad line and a mountain range that coils along the border areas like a serpent. It was sandwiched between a 3/4-mile railroad tunnel that provided one of my favorite ghost stories from Grandma Hatfield and from Dad, and the Tug Valley Country club. The club is a 9-hole golf course built and tended (back in the day) by the local coal barons and their friends, politicians, and so forth. I'm sorry I didn't get names of some of Dad's cohorts and the objects of the stories from his escapades during ten years as a caddy and grass cutter on the course. Maybe someone somewhere may read this blog and be able to share names of their family members as they might recognize them from my accounts.

When Grandpa Hatfield died in 1956 (a year before my birth) the family talked Grandma into selling the little farm and moving to Williamson, where Dad's only brother and older sister lived at that time. The country club purchased the property and expanded the length of the course. But Grandma wisely kept the mineral rights, because the N&W folks had surveyed and done mineral testing years before, and she knew there was natural gas and oil both waiting beneath the surface for someone to develop the most efficient way to get it up and out of there...which will lend itself to a few future stories.

SO I am spending this weekend ruminating about Dad, especially all the things he taught me about how to live outdoors and about farming and growing things. And at the same time reading back over the history of my great-great-grandfather, who one hot August day didn't know when to quit drinking and bating the enemy into what led to his death and hastened a bloody part of West Virginia history and lore. Unlike his parents and siblings, Dad was prone most of his life to live more like Ellison, and then spent the last ten years of life paying the price physically for all his errant ways. But he was a Hatfield, a REAL Hatfield and part of a family whose name is notoriously known all over the world. And that means I am a Hatfield, part of that same bloodline, a descendant of a man who fought in the War Between The States, became a decorated officer and even saw the conflict at Gettysburg and participated in Pickett's Charge that fateful July 3rd in 1863. A family whose roots run back to a Joseph Hatfield who served bravely in the Revolution against England, and to the town in England carrying its name, where resides a castle that was for generations a summer retreat for the royal family.

For now, that's the first and main reason I am a Hatfield. I was born into this great family. And you aren't. But, your family may be just as storied and legendary and hilarious as mine, if you take time to look into it. I hope you find something along those lines. But unless you were born into this clan...you're just not a Hatfield.