The Sutton-Taylor Feud

Times in Texas after the Civil War were tempestuous and lawless. The Six-Shooter was often judge and jury as men battered by war tried to rebuild lives and fortunes from the ashes. The “Sutton-Taylor Feud” erupted from this tinderbox in DeWitt County, Texas. Written by a descendant of a feudist, this book is not a traditional family account. The author uses histories of the feud, contemporaneous news articles, court records, private papers, and material in the archives of the Texas State Library to cut through the haze of hearsay, legend and fiction often obscuring the events of the DeWitt County wars a century ago. This story of Texas during Reconstruction will interest readers encountering it for the first time. Students and historians interested in the old Regular troubles will find new material here as well. The primary aim of the author is to tell the story as it was. The result is a straight-forward story of action and conflict told by a man who has seen much action himself.