The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1901-05-12
F. IN ORIGINAL SRNDTHRFI
nIETHOD OF A KENTUCKY YOUTH
IN DISSIPATING HIS
PATRIMONY
he SOON BURNED HIS MONEY
Mountain Faction Which Killed His
Father Put to Utter ROut
While the Coin Held
Out.

In New York had been under discussion
and the Western man, side-tracked In the
conversation, had become irritated. At
the very first opportunity, says the New
York Times, he int rrupted:
anybody can spend money in New
York" he declared. ON every case YOU
have mentioned the methods of dissipat-
ing fortunes have been CT about kind.
Diamonds for actresses, race horses. and
drink, with occasionally little gambling.
have accounted for every one of your
prodigals The only thing surprising
about your spendthIifts of the East is
that they have not developed small
amount of originality.
Now I had the fortune TO know a
young man not many years ago up IN
the kentucky mountains who found a
way to get rid of a reasonably large
estate for that part of the country in a
remarkably short time. and that, too, in
a way that was distinctly his own. In
New York fortune means a round
millions or 50. In Kentucky, generally
a hundred thousand is regarded in about
the same light. In the mountains YOU
divide again by ten
The particular spendthrift ! have in
mind was young Avis Turner Of BeH
county. Kentucky, at the time I speak Of.
a frequenter of the town i'll Bell known
as Pineville Avis was the son of Capt
Jack Turner, a leading politician of Bell
county and an important parsonage in his
community. Capt. Jack was a rich man,
as mountaineers 90, and in addition to q
large and we'll cultivated farm. had bonds
and mortgages which made him a power
in local affairs Young Avis had been to
school. and in other ways enjoyed adj
vantages unusual for young men of his
type.
The lad took a very eager interest in
one particular quarrel, in which his
father had a leading part, namely, a
feud with another mountain faction, led
by General Sowders the elder Turner
being a man of parts. and consequently
mixed up in about all the trouble that
was going in his locality.
"Alvis inherited his fathers estate and
fights rather suddenly as a result of a
rife shot fired from a hotel window in
Pineville one day, Capt. Jack. who had
been involved in a political row, being
snuffed out in exactly the same style as
was the late Kentucky Gov. elect William
GOehel. No one ever knew VINO killed his
father, but Avis took it for granted that
SOwders following was responsible. After
the custom of the mountain people, ne set
himself the task of avenging the murder
He was sole heir, and with all speed pos
sible he had the estate settled, and though
still a minor took possession of every
thing and turned it into ready money.
With something in the neighborhocd of
$4,000 a few weeks later, he took the
warpath. A young man with that amount
of money could not want for friends any
where, but in the kentucky mountains
the money and the prospects of plenty of
lighting brought TO the boy in a remark
able short time all of the most desperate
OF Jack Turner's old friends, and after
that all that Avis had to do was to pay
and lead.
q have never figured out just how the
lad managed to get rid of the money he
spent, but from all that is known he real
~ shot away his paFtimony in a very
short time. He armed and mounted his
band, and did it in the most approved
fashion. Che thing l remember that call
sed for the unqualified admiration of his
own kind in the mountains was the -pur-
chase Of guns of the pattern read of in
the stories of big game Shooting in africa,
the kind of gun that shoots explosive
builetS That sort of thing Is barred in
warfare between nations. but in the Ken
lucky mountains there are no rules and
II one starts out to kill another the most
effective way possible is the way most
approved. The hombshell guns that Alvis
bought commanded unbounded aumira-
ton. and I do not doubt that if the al
had announced himself as d candidate for
congress at the moment he would have
nau a cnance Tor election
Young Turner went on with a single
mindedneSS that was most remarkable
and the zeal he put into trying to kill off
the Sowders' party was exceeded only by
the cost of his campaign. lie had a fair
amount Of success, too, and the feud was
quite as bloody as it should have been I'M
der the conditions. l recall a sight OF the
first victim OF the explosive bullets. man
named Jem Burch, who with party of
Sowderites, happened along a bridlepath
near Pineville at the side of which Avis
and chosen few of his followers wer:. in
ambush. Later it was said that Avis re-
GREETED his haste on the ground that # h.
had waited he could have bagged the en-
tire party.
IT seems that the shooting with ex-
plosive bullets began when Burch was
the only man in range, however and the
others got away Burchs body looked
as if it might have been in a dynamite
biow-up. l cannot recall how many
others We're killed in the Turner's wders
feud, but the number certa My cut down
the population of Bell county, while the
amount of powder that was burned was
something frightful.
when an English syndicate that own
ed mach property In Bell finally brought
about peace by the novel method of buy
ing the farms CT all the fighting men un-
der the condition that they move out OF
the. county, Alvis. Turner was said to
have spent all his fathers estate. The
method Of peace-making adopted by the
English syndicate in the meantime had g
thinned out the partisans on both sides
that young Turner was almost alone, and
the lighting naturally died away to the
point that Bell county became too slow
for that young man. He had burned
up a very great sum of money, and l
really think he made more noise and stir
with his mountain fortune than great
many of the million-dollar spendthrifts
of the more populous East.
The last I heard of Avis Turner he