So it is with the great Rowan County war. There were many agencies at work that contributed, little by little, but none the less surely, to that state of anarchy which disgraced Rowan County and Kentucky during the eighties. The evil influences which initiated it were: Politics and Whiskey. A weak-kneed, yea, corrupt administration of justice permitted its continuation. The reign of terror which continued so long unhindered could have been crushed in its infancy with any sort of an honest, determined effort at law enforcement. A verse or two of Mulligan's "IN KENTUCKY" finds excellent application here: "The bluegrass waves the bluest In Kentucky; Yet, bluebloods are the fewest (?) In Kentucky; Moonshine is the clearest, By no means the dearest, And yet, it acts the _queerest_ In Kentucky. "The dove-notes are the saddest, In Kentucky: The streams dance on the gladdest In Kentucky: Hip pockets are the thickest, Pistol hands the slickest, The cylinder turns quickest In Kentucky. "The song birds are the sweetest In Kentucky: The thoroughbreds are fleetest In Kentucky: Mountains tower proudest, Thunder peals the loudest, The landscape is the grandest, AND POLITICS--the damndest In Kentucky." In the long continued struggle which brought Rowan County into disrepute, many families of high reputation, men of wealth and influence, as well as men of reckless, undaunted, desperate character, were pitted against each other. Officers of the law, lawyers, judges and politicians of more than ordinary ability and reputation, quarreled, disputed and excited such unreasoning passion as to result in bloodshed. After that the dogged, stubborn determination of the different factions admitted of no other settlement of the controversy save by the arbitrament of arms, a war to the death. Patrick Henry cried out before the Virginia Convention: "Gentlemen may cry peace, peace, but there is no peace." In Rowan County, too, men cried continually for peace, yet there was to be no peace until anarchy had almost depopulated the county and its name had become synonymous with outlawry. The only alternative left was to leave the country or fight. Some did leave, most of them remained and fought, fought with a courage worthy of a better cause. The courts appeared powerless. The officers were themselves bitter partisans. The government of the State, when applied to for troops to assist in restoring order, sometimes refused aid, owing to a technicality in the law, and thus was precipitated the famous bloody battle at Morehead, in which many men were killed and wounded.