The First Serial Killers of Appalachia With Over 40 Victims

The Harpe brothers are believed to have been the first serial killers in Appalachia. Their parents were Scottish immigrants who immigrated to the United States. and settled in Orange County, North Carolina. Micajah ¨Big¨ Harpe and Wiley ¨Little¨ Harpe, the murderous pair, were called brothers, but it is believed they were cousins, and they were the deadliest outlaws in Appalachia.

In 1775, the pair left North Carolina and headed to Virginia to obtain jobs as slave overseers; however, the American Revolution also just started. The brothers ended up siding with the British, and their interests appeared more violent. They took joy in burning farms and torturing the patriots. Little Harp was shot by Captain James Wood when he was attempting to rape a girl in North Carolina; he was wounded but survived.

The brothers joined the regular British army in 1780; however, a year later, they left and joined a group of Cherokee Indians. They raided settlements in North Carolina and Tennessee. However, the brothers wanted revenge on Captain Wood, so they kidnapped his daughter, Susan, and a little girl, Maria Davidson. They took them for ¨wives¨ and treated them awful.

It was at this time that a man named Moses Doss was concerned about the women, so the Harpes killed him. The Harpes then moved into the Cherokee-Chickamauga village of Nickajack and lived there for the next 12 years. The women became pregnant, and the children were killed.

At this time, the British surrendered at Yorktown in 1781, and the Harpe brothers went to fight for them yet again. In September 1794, the Americans planned to take over the Indians at Nickajack, and the Harpes found out and fled before the village was attacked.

They took their wives and settled in a camp nearby, and by 1797, they were living near Knoxville. However, Little Harpe met a girl and married her, a minister's daughter, Sarah Rice. Then Big Harpe took his other wive as his own and claimed both women as his.

However, in 1798, their killing spree began. The brothers killed two men in Tennessee and, by December, had made their way to Kentucky, where they killed two more men. The brothers were only motivated by violence and would leave their victims disemboweled, fill their abdominal cavities with rocks, and sink them into the river.

Another man, John Langford, was then found dead, and a local innkeeper blamed the Harpes. The pair was placed in jail in Danville, Kentucky, but escaped. A group went in search of the brothers, but instead, one of them ended up dead and mutilated.

The Governor of Kentucky then offered a $300 reward for each brother; instead, the Harpes continued killing. They killed two more men, Edmonton and Stump. The pair was also believed to have killed three men whom they saw at the Saline River.

At this time, the Harpes had moved their wives and children in with the Samuel Mason Gang. This gang caught slow-moving flatboats on the Ohio River. It is reported that the gang was ruthless, but the Harpes were worse, and the Harpes would take travelers up to the top of the mountain, strip them naked, and throw them off the top; the gang asked them to leave.

The Harpes then went back to Eastern Tennessee and continued their spree. July 1798, they killed Bradbury, Harden, William Ballard, and Coffee. Ballard was found in Holton River, disemboweled. John Tully was also found dead. Then, in Kentucky, John Graves and his son were found dead with their heads cut off.

Then, they killed a little slave girl and an entire family who were asleep in their camp. However, the Harpes also killed their own. Big Harpe killed his baby daughter by bashing her head against a tree because she was crying.

Then, more murders kept appearing, and Trowbridge was found disemboweled in Highland Creek. The pair were once given somewhere to stay at the Stegall home, and the brothers killed an overnight guest, Major William Love, and Mrs. Stegall's four-month-old baby, and Mrs. Stegall.

They were being hunted at this point, and the brothers headed west. However, on August 24, 1799, the group had found the Harpe brothers. They asked them to surrender, but instead, the Harpe brothers ran away, and Big Harpe was shot in the leg and back.

The group caught him, and as he was dying, he confessed to killing at least 20 people. Mr. Stegall then cut his head off while Big was still conscious and hanged the head on a pole near Henderson, Kentucky. Now, that crossroads is called Harpes Head.

However, Little Harpe escaped and joined the Mason Gang pirates at the Cave in the Rock. He remained with them for four years under the alias John Setton. However, there was a large reward for the head of the gang's leader, Mason. Harpe decided to kill Mason with a fellow pirate, James May and collected the reward money. When they went to give the heads to the officials, they were immediately recognized as outlaws and caught.

January 1804, they were executed, and their heads were cut off and placed on stakes along the Natchez Road. It is believed that the Harpes killed over 40 men, women, and children during their killing spree.