le had grown old and years before had succeeded his
father, Coonrod Pile, as head of the family. All his sons had grown to
manhood. He was a non-combatant, but a Union sympathizer. His four sons
were divided in their allegiance--two upon each side. And two of them
paid the supreme price, and they paid for their convictions as they rode
along public highways.

Conrad Pile, Jr., "Rod" as he was known, like his father, Elijah Pile,
was a non-combatant, but sympathized with the North. In the autumn of
1863 for some cause, unknown to his relatives, he was taken prisoner by
Confederate troops, members of Champ Ferguson's band. As they rode along
the road with him, some shots were fired. They left him there.

In June of the following year, Jeff Pile, a brother of "Rod," was riding
along the road beyond the mill that creaks in the waters of Wolf River.
He was going to visit a brother. He had taken no active part in the war,
but was a Southern sympathizer. Some of "Tinker" Beaty's men galloped
into sight, fired, galloped on. Mountain men fire but once.

But the murder of Jeff Pile threw a red shadow across the years that
were to come after the war was ended.

The war-feuds of Fentress county did not end with the ending of the war.
There was lawlessness for years. Some of the Union men and Union
sympathizers, in the majority in the county during hostilities, assumed
to the full the new power that came to them by the war's outcome.
Conservative civic leaders sought to reestablish a condition of peace,
but the lawless and desperate element prepared personally to profit from
the situation.

Farms had been deserted and many of the owners of these lands who had
fought on the side of the Confederacy were kept away through the threats
of death should they return, and some who had remained throughout the
war were forced to flee to protect their lives from those who coveted
their property.

A series of land-frauds sprang up under the cloak of the law. Upon
vacant farms false debts were levied; fake administrators took charge of
lands whose owners had died during the conflict; other property was
hastily forced under sale for taxes.

That the proceedings should appear legal, the foreclosures were by due
process of law. But if quietly circulated warnings against a general
bidding for property when offered at court sale were not effective, some
well-known desperate character would appear at the sale and threaten
anyone who dared bid a