Apr 07, 2022 - Sale 2600

Sale 2600 - Lot 291

Price Realized: $ 375
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 600 - $ 900
(WEST VIRGINIA.) Pair of Real Photo postcards depicting "The Hatfield section of West Va." Pair of postcards, each 3 3/4 x 5 1/4 inches, inscribed in image on recto, with address, canceled stamps, and Eckman, WV postmarks dated 11 April 1907 on verso; minimal wear. West Virginia, 1907
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Additional Details

These two postcards depict an impoverished but well-armed West Virginia family. The sender has inscribed the seated portrait: "This house is in the territory I travel. It is in the Hatfield section of WVa. Every member of the family carries a gun. This picture was taken last summer by a traveling man." The other photo, depicting the family riding upon two oxen, is inscribed "Come out to West Va. and I will take you for a ride. This is the way they travel out here." The postcards were postmarked in Eckman, WV, perhaps 30 miles southeast of Hatfield territory, and mailed to a friend in Roanoke, VA.

We have not ascertained whether this family actually belonged to the famed Hatfields, or which members might be depicted. West Virginia University holds a colorized version of the postcard captioned "Typical Mountain Home and Family, Wyoming County, W. Va."--an area east of Hatfield country, but not far from where the present postcards were mailed. Our correspondent was not the only one to draw a line from this image to the Hatfields, though. The colorized postcard was used as the lead image in a PBS American Experience video, "How the Newspapers Covered the Hatfield-McCoy Feud."