Perry County Vendetta

A KENTUCKY FEUD

BEGINNING A TRIAL WHICH INVOLVES THE PERRY COUNTY VENDETTA

WINCHESTER, KENTUCKY, Nov. 9,1890

The case of "Joe" Davidson, a party to the famous French-Eversole factional feud, in Perry County
was taken up yesterday. The Court House was crowded, the local interest being great, and hundreds 
of people from Perry and adjoining counties being present.

Davidson, the prisoner, is indicted jointly with a number of others of both factions for the murder 
of "Ed" Campbell and John McKnight, and is also indicted separately for the murder of Canpbell. The 
latter was killed at Hazard just one year ago yesterday. At the November term of the Circuit Court
presided over by Judge W.H. Hearst of Breathitt County, both sides came to town armed, expecting 
trouble. They mingled together on the streets, talked with each other, and drank together from Sunday
until Thursday, when a series of minor quarrels culminated in a general fight between Henry Davidson
Jesse Fields, and others of the French faction, in the jailer's residence, and a number of the Eversoles
in houses and other places on the outside, in which "Ed" Campbell, and an Eversole man, was killed. 
Campbell was standing by a large poplar tree, firing into the jailer's residence, and was killed by
Davidson, who shot him from the door of his residence, 200 yards away, with a Winchester rifle. The
ball entered Campbell's side, killing him instantly. The firing was kept up at intervals during the
night and next morning. John McKnight, another Eversole adherent, was killed as he opened the door 
to step out.

The case of the Commonwealth was opened by W.P. Bentley, who gave an account of the rise and progress
of the feud in which so much blood has been shed and which had terrorized whole counties for years. He
was present at the time of the fight and gave a graphic description of the whole scene, claiming that
the prisoner was not in danger and could not have known that his brother was an inmate of the house 
and that the killing therefore in his defense. Davidson ran a saloon in open violation of the law, and
the liquid dispensed over his bar had had much to do with inflaming the already heated passions of the
factions. The trial went over until tomorrow.