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Home : The Hangman's Noose : Frontier Justice :Bald Knobbers
After the Civil War Southwest Missouri was a devastated area characterized by a failing economy, high taxes, lawlessness, disorder, and a general breakdown of society, especially in the small towns and rural regions of the area. Thus the stage was set for a conflict between the settlers, mostly Republican and law-abidders, and the natives, mostly Democrats who liked the status quo. All that was needed was a catalyst for action. in 1883 that spark was provided when a new settler moved into an existing log cabin near Kirbyville MO. When Nathaniel N. Kinney settled in Taney County, Missouri in 1883, he found a deplorable state of affairs. Outlaws and renegade ruled, most of them holdovers from the bushwhackers and guerillas that rampaged through Missouri during the Civil War. After the war, the lack of even minimal law enforcement afforded outlaws free reign. Clans elected and controlled the local sheriff, whose authority it was to subpoena jury panels. If outlaws or their relatives didn’t sit on the juries, they bribed those who did. As a result, although as many as forty murders occurred in Taney County between 1865 and 1885, not a single suspect was convicted. Taney County includes the towns of Branson, Forsyth, Hollister, Merriam Woods, Rockaway Beach, Table Rock, and Taneyville. Nat McKinney feared no man, standing six feet six and weighing in at more than 300 pounds. After yet another murder on September 22, 1883, McKinney began to consider forming a law and order league patterned after other vigilante groups that were popular during the time. When a biased jury acquitted the murderer, McKinney called together twelve of the county’s leaders who met in secret, forming a committee to fight the lawlessness and elect officials who would enforce the law. The group became known as the Bald Knobbers. Though the Bald Knobbers began with "good intentions,” the violence displayed by the vigilante group eventually gained national attention. The organization grew rapidly and by the time they met on April 5, 1885, two hundred people showed up at a meeting on Snapp’s Bald, a hilltop south of Forsyth, Missouri. Kinney, an excellent speaker, was unanimously elected as their leader. Extracting a vow of secrecy from his followers, Kinney instructs them to recruit new members to carry out the goals of the group. Within days, the Bald Knobbers made a public display of their force when over 100 hundred of them broke open the door of the Taney county jail and kidnapped brothers, Frank and Tubal Taylor. The Taylor brothers were well known in the area for their viciousness and were being jailed for wounding a storekeeper during an argument over credit for a pair of boots. The local storeowner, John Dickenson, happened to be a Bald Knobber. After breaking the two out of jail, the mob hauled the brothers south of Forsyth and hanged them. News of the hangings echoed across the state clear to the state capital. Some cheered and others were heartbroken. Some praised Captain Kinney and his night riders for taking justice into their own hands. Others, decried the breakdown of all law and order in Taney county. The degree of violence appalled several of the founding members who quickly dropped out, but the Bald Knobbers continued to grow and before long the group had between 500 and 1,000 members. Kinney’s group began to further "correct” the lawlessness by making night rides to scare such "lowlifes” as drunks, gamblers or "loose” women into changing their ways. They frightened wife beaters, couples "living in sin,” and men who failed to support their families. Sometimes they even called on those they simply considered "ornery.” The community began into split into two factions – those who followed or supported Kinney and those who thought him a tyrant and wished him dead. Many well known criminals left Taney county within days of the Taylor's hanging and they never returned. But not all were as scared of Captain Kinney and the Baldknobbers. One of the most vocal opponents was a roughian by the name of Andrew Coggburn. He often made fun of the Baldknobbers and even composed and sang a song deriding the group. He apparently overstepped his boldness when he left a miniature coffin for Captain Kinney on the front steps of the Sunday school where Kinney preached and taught the scriptures. This was too much for Kinney. The two finally met in February of 1886 outside the Sunday school. Coggburn, accompanied by his friend, Sam Snapp, confronted Kinney and a gunfight ensued with Kinney killing Coggburn. Kinney was eventually found innocent by a coroner's jury and walked away a free man. The violence increased as the group would flog or brand suspected thieves, arsonists and robbers. They would hang or beat a man to death for assault, disturbing the peace or destroying property. Some Bald Knobbers began to use their menacing power for greedy and selfish purposes as they went after men who owed them money or who owned land that they coveted. They "settled” feuds over fence lines and property deeds, whipped men for disrupting services in their churches, or for supporting the wrong candidate in the election. However, the harshest punishment was saved for those who talked against them. Some victims who resisted the Bald Knobbers disappeared. Several turned up in the woods beaten to death. Those who lived to tell claimed that Kinney’s followers killed more than thirty men and at least four women, but estimates that are more realistic place the number between fifteen and eighteen. As the Bald Knobbers grew in numbers and their violent acts escalated, a vehement resentment festered among a small group of men who called themselves the Anti-Bald Knobbers. However, the vigilantes thwarted every effort to mitigate the situation. When a judge called for a state audit to ferret out corruption among the county’s officeholders, the courthouse was burned down. The nation’s newspapers published stories about the bloody war in Missouri and the Bald Knobbers were described as the nation’s largest and fiercest vigilante movement. Approximately a year after the reported disbandment of the Taney county group, the Christian county Baldknobbers once again cast the spotlight on Southern Missouri vigilantism with their raid on a seemingly innocent group of citizens. In 1887, the Bald Knobbers killed William Edens and Charley Green, both of whom had been critical of the group, and seriously injured several members of their families. This brought a further outcry from the nation’s newspapers. Twenty Bald Knobbers were arrested and did not put up a resistance because of their respect for the Sheriff. Later that month a grand jury was empanelled and their investigation into the Edens-Green murders led to the charging of 16 individuals in the murder. Prosecutor G.A. Watson was assisted by "Babe" Harrington from Springfield and the trials began on August 22, 1887 in an almost carnival like sitting. The defendants had an array of lawyers including the famous Sempronious "Pony" Boyd. While most of the charged were found guilty only four were sentenced to death; Dave Walker, his son William Walker, John Matthews and his nephew Wiley Matthews. The others were given a range of punishment from $50.00 fines to several years in the state penitentiary. On August 20, 1888, Nat Kinney was shot and killed by Billy Miles, a member of the Anti-Bald Knobbers, in a planned assassination. Though Miles was tried for Kinney’s murder, he was found not guilty based on self-defense. With the death of Captain Kinney, the Taney county Baldknobbers had lost their leader and their presence was weakened over the next few years until they no longer existed. However, the Baldknobbers of Taney county had influenced others in adjacent counties and it was here that the Baldknobbers gained their most notoriety as well as exhibited their greatest degree of violence. Though the violence continued for a short time, by 1899, the era of the Bald Knobbers had run its course. Outsiders had an impression that the hillsmen of the Ozarks were a violent breed, while in reality they were not much different then many other law and order groups that had sprung up all over the nation after the Civil War.
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