Source: https://www.ozarksalive.com/stories/the-real-story-behind-the-bald-knobbers
The Bald Knobbers were vigilantes who operated in Taney, Christian and Douglas counties in the late 1800s.
The Bald Knobbers rode into a moment of Ozarks history when their presence was needed — or at least its members thought it was. In the 1880s, the uniquely named vigilantes made a name through heavy-handed tactics to maintain law and order and morality as they saw it. Ultimately, they created a lot of strong feelings — and a significant amount of publicity — through newspapers across the country.The first group began in Taney County, Missouri, in 1884 or 1885. Others, including in Douglas and Christian counties, followed. In other places, the Bald Knobbers got credit for work that may or may not have been their doings but were happenings that could be linked to the deeds of vigilantes. But they didn’t last long. By the end of the decade, the two biggest Bald Knobber groups were gone. Taney County’s Bald Knobbers peacefully disbanded after actions by Missouri Governor John S. Marmaduke. The Christian County group went down in a much more dramatic style, with three of its members being hanged on the Ozark square in 1889.“They started as good guys from good families, and they wanted to get things straightened after the Civil War. Everybody did,” said Marie Day, a Christian County historian about what she’d want people to know about the Bald Knobbers. “That was the only way they could figure out how to do it. “It’s like they kind of had a reason for being bad because they had to survive.” Before the Bald Knobbers The Bald Knobbers were one of several vigilante groups in the late 1800s. They were the result of uncertainty and concern in a land still regrouping after the Civil War.“The Civil War led to a surge of lawlessness, both in southwest Missouri and the state at large, and an increased cultural acceptance of violence and vigilantism as a means of solving problems and deterring crime,” wrote Dr. Matthew J. Hernando, author of “Faces Like Devils,” a book about the Bald Knobbers. “Historians have described the post-Civil War period as a ‘reign of terror’ in which former soldiers and guerrillas left the battlefields and faded into Missouri’s countryside only to reemerge later as criminals and outlaws.”The bloody period tore families apart and brought devastation to the region, and the years that followed continued a sense of violence and unrest.“Another condition which permitted outlaws to exist is that during the war the able men were away fighting either because they volunteered or were forced,” notes an article in a 1983 Bittersweet magazine. “Whichever army came through would conscript any men they could find. The women and children and old men were left to live as they could to raise the food for themselves and what stock the maurading armies or outlaws spared them. With law enforcement systems broken down, with alternate periods of Union or Confederate army occupation, men like Alf Bolin and his gang had free sway. The inhabitants lived in constant terror, hiding any older boys or men as well as any livestock from the armies and outlaws.”Bolin was an extreme example, as the notorious outlaw boasted of murdering 40 people (said to be an exaggeration, but you get the idea) before he was killed and beheaded. While people danced in the street when Bolin was killed, it didn’t stop the feeling that crime was out of control. That fear existed in parallel with an influx of newcomers and escalating county debt. “Many felt threatened by their seemingly foreign neighbors and the changes to their way of life that the new socioeconomic order portended,” wrote Hernando. Additionally, he noted, “the Civil War helped create the necessary conditions for groups like the Bald Knobbers to exist by leaving a legacy of bitterness and mistrust between supporters of the Union and the Confederacy.Those realities were kindling a killing set aflame in 1883, when a man named Al Layton was arrested, tried and released for the killing of James “Jim” Everett, a beloved Taney County storekeeper who helped keep families afloat after a drought in 1882.“People were incensed,” wrote Lucile Morris Upton in “Bald Knobbers,” a book published in 1939. “Many of them still owed money, and most of them owed loyalty, to Jim Everett. They said this was another instance in which the courts had failed to punish a Taney County killer. All through that winter men talked in little groups about trying to take the law into their own hands. Often they met behind closed doors in solemn conference. Almost a year wore along, and still men were asking what good citizens should do to insure law and order.”That led to the start of the Bald Knobbers in 1884 or 1885.
“Old” Forsyth, where the Taney County Bald Knobbers organized, is now covered by Bull Shoals Lake. (Courtesy of the Johnson Family Collection and Richard Crabtree)
The group organized in a town that no longer exists – at least in the form it was back then – as it came to be in “old” Forsyth, a town now covered by Bull Shoals Lake. Later they met atop bare hilltops known as “balds,” ultimately earning the Bald Knobber moniker. Their alleged goal was to help maintain law and order. “When we organized, law enforcement hereabouts was broken down,” noted an anonymous source in “Bald Knobbers.” “We met here in Forsyth in the back end of a store building and formed what we then called a citizen’s committee. The members took an oath to see that good officers were elected and to support them.”A key name in the group was Nat Kinney, a larger-than-life saloon operator who fought for the Union in the Civil War. He and his family moved from Springfield to Taney County in 1883. It sounds like the nearly seven-foot-tall Kinney had strong opinions before he moved to the hills, but those came out in greater force as he helped organize locals for causes in which he believed. And those feelings led to action when he felt a force for law and order was needed.He expresses those through a personal statement printed in Upton’s book: “So far as I could learn the history of Taney County has been a record of lawlessness and disregard of social proprieties. When I came here some four years ago (1883) it was common for men to live with women to whom they had never been married. Why, one old Mormonlike neighbor kept six women. Then county was $42,000 in debt, and had not even a plank to show for it. The money had simply been stolen. That wasn’t all. Over thirty men had been shot to death in the county since the war, and not one of the murderers had been punished by the civil authorities.“Well I had come to here to lead a retired and quiet life, but I could not refrain from expressing my opinions of such things and I can not refrain now.”Reign of TerrorThe first reported instance of the Bald-Knobbers-involved doings was in April 1885, when the group was allegedly involved with lynching — hanging without legal process — two men. Frank and Tubal Taylor had shot a storekeeper and his wife; locals believed that justice would not be served, so they took matters into their own hands.“So many lawbreakers had gotten off scott-free for 20, 25 years after the Civil War that they weren’t really concerned,” said Curtis Copeland, leader of the Society of Ozarkian Hillcrofters, a preservation group he helped revive and a local Bald Knobber expert. “They were ready to bond out. Before they could get bonded out, a lynch mob formed, which was basically Bald Knobbers, and they hung them. “That’s when everybody’s like, ‘Sure, this might have been a law-and-order thing, but this is just too far.’ It just escalated from there. Very quickly, the whole county, you were either for them or against them. There wasn’t really any middle ground.” It didn’t take long before there was opposition to the group. In early 1885 – around the time of those first hangings – a group called the Anti-Bald Knobbers also organized.
Shortly after the Bald Knobbers organized, an opposition group — the Anti-Bald Knobbers — also formed. (Courtesy the Kansas City Times)
“A lot of what would become the Anti-Bald Knobbers were residents of Taney County well before the Civil War,” Copeland said. “So they had a little of pushback about the ‘newcomer’ type of thing.” That opposition didn’t stop the group’s actions, which quickly escalated through word and deed. They exercised their own form of justice across the county, leading some papers to print when someone they wrote about in Taney County was not a Bald Knobber.“Taney County is making herself a most unenviable record, and it appears that her example in mob violence is spreading over the entire southwest,” noted the Pineville News in August 1885.According to the Jefferson City Tribune in November 1885, the Bald Knobbers told some families they had to leave the county – which they did. They told Jerome Winslow to leave because he talked too much and was a friend of the Taylors, the men who the group had lynched a few months prior. They told a man he had to move a fence because it was in their way. He chose not to, so they pushed it down. They arrested two young men “who refused to surrender to about forty of them.” The pair were taken without warrant to a magistrate who fined them $25 for carrying concealed weapons. “The father of these boys is one of the best citizens of the county and has been for years treasurer of the Masonic lodge of the county,” the paper continued. “He intends to leave as soon as his affairs are fixed up. The justice of Oliver township left the county and moved to Lawrence County. He could do no business. He was not a Bald Knobber.“Jefferson Weaver, son-in-law of ex-Sheriff Moseby, was ordered away, so he may not be present as a witness in a case of felonious assault in which one of the Knobbers was a defendant. These are only a few of the many cases of personal injury charged to these regulators.” In 1886, about 75 Bald Knobbers allegedly rode into Ava “and read the citizens and officers a lecture, then fired a couple of shots into a lawyers office and cautioned the editors of the Record about what they published in their paper. (“The next week the editors of the Record gave them to understand that they would print whatever they saw fit, and take care of themselves, and it is very likely the B.K.’s will give the Record office a wide berth the next time they come to town.”) Later that year, some 50 horsemen rode into Marshfield. “They are supposed to be ‘bald-knobbers,’ as they posted a notice on the court house door requesting witnesses to testify to the truth and referring them to the ten commandments,” noted the Springfield Daily Leader in September 1886. “No one was harmed. They are supposed to be the same gang who cut off the whiskers of the justice of the peace at Seymour recently.”Expansion beyond Taney CountyPapers gave the Bald Knobbers considerable publicity, most assuredly raising public awareness, and an interest grew in other places about similar efforts. Some vigilante efforts in other Ozarks counties were attributed or linked in some way to the Bald Knobbers. Perhaps there were self-described groups, or others labeled unfortunate realities as the work of the Bald Knobbers when there wasn’t any connection. “We're talking about an era where there's a lot of vigilante activity,” Copeland said. “It's kind of the classic Bonnie and Clyde or Jesse James type of thing, where a lot of times a group or individuals get saddled with a criminal act or something that they didn't necessarily do.”But in at least two Ozarks counties – Douglas and Christian – there were verified Bald Knobbers. Some of the previously described Bald Knobber actions may have been through one of those groups. The Douglas County group pulled from close to the Webster County line, I’ve been told. Stories of that group have been heard by folks like Cinita Brown, now 94, whose late husband’s grandfather was involved in some way with the local knobbers. “I knew of a family in Douglas County,” she said. “The husband had been older than the wife and they married, and she had a little boy. Then when he was very small, she died. Of course, he couldn’t take care of the child so he hired a girl to come and take care of the little boy. “She actually was abusing the little boy – just physically abusing him, and emotionally abusing him. The little boy got old enough to tell some people. Different people kept hearing this same story from the little boy. “So the story kept being repeated and finally they (the Bald Knobbers) got together and got their uniforms on and went to the house with a bundle of switches tied together. They knocked on the door and she came to the door and they left the switches and said, ‘Tonight we’re leaving them. … If we ever hear one more story about how you take care of little Johnny, we will be back.’ She went ahead and left the country. That was a known story.” Christian County’s group was organized in 1885, following a markedly different track from the original group. Taney County Bald Knobbers were focused on law and order, while Christian County were more focused on morality – a reality that appears linked to places like Chadwick, which today is a sleepy village but in that era was a boomtown tied to the railroad, complete with saloons and brothels.
Chadwick, Missouri, is shown in 2025.
“You have all these sustenance farmers that were just trying to make a living, and all of a sudden had this new income,” Copeland said. “So with income comes the folks that want to get that money. You start to get your vice, and pretty soon Chadwick was a very rowdy town of gambling, alcohol, all that stuff.”And so the Bald Knobbers became the Morality Police. “The Bald Knobbers paid our town another visit last night about 1 o’clock,” noted the Pineville News, reporting a Chadwick dispatch, in November 1886. “They came for the purpose of raiding the saloons, pouring out the whiskey and ordering the saloon keepers to leave town within five days. They went deliberately to work to carry out their purpose by opening the faucets, driving in the heads of the barrels, emptying the bottles, etc.”
A replica of the Christian County Bald Knobber mask is on display at the Chadwick Museum.
It’s the Chadwick group that is tied to the Bald Knobber’s distinctive mask: A black face and head covering complete with horns.“What really also set them apart was they had a brand — and that brand was the Christian County Bald Knobbers’ masks,” Copeland said.“Whether they knew it or not at the time, they had a brand and that carried on.”The Demise of the Bald KnobbersUntil they didn’t. From high places to low drops, the Bald Knobbers came to dramatic ends in different ways.The Taney County group officially ended in 1886 after intervention from Missouri leaders. “General Jamison, after a thorough examination of the case, taking evidence from both of the factions, called a meeting and gave the leaders of each side good advice,” noted the Tribune. “He told them that there were times when a vigilance committee filled a want, but the perpetuation of such an organization was hurtful to any community. It was wrong for any body of men to take the law into their own hands, and it always resulted in evil. “The meeting and the talk of General Jamison had the effect of harmonizing the factions and allaying the bitter feeling which has existed for years in Taney County, and the day after the general left the Bald Knobbers held a meeting, the proceedings of which were mailed to him…”Those proceedings decreed that the “organization of the citizens’ committee be disbanded.” Another article noted that, “The peace and prosperity of the county is now permanently assured, which, added to the fact that valuable lead mines have been discovered on Secretary of State McGrath’s farm, is certain to bring Taney County up to the standard of a majority of the counties in the state.” Some doubted whether the group had actually disbanded or simply said it had. But the Christian County Bald Knobbers were still active at this time; their presence was not part of the supposed capitulation.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch; May 10, 1889
It wasn’t too long, however, before they came to an end (on paper) in very dramatic fashion as well. Steps to that reality were set in motion in 1887, when the group met what was known as Smelter Holler near Sparta and Chadwick. Its leader was a man named Dave Walker, born in 1847 in Kentucky before coming to the Ozarks.“The men present discussed a variety of topics, much of it unrelated to any kind of vigilante business,” wrote Hernando in “Faces Like Devils.” “Gilbert Applegate recalled that they talked about ‘shooting, and making ties, and so-on … and bragging on their guns and one thing and another.’ Some of the men suggested whipping various individuals, but most of those present rejected these proposals. Then someone proposed that they go pour out some whiskey belonging to a local moonshiner named William (“Bucky Bill”) Roberts, to which Dave Walker agreed.” That is where the plan when awry. Because as the group departed, some of them split off when they realized how close they were to William Edens’ cabin. The man had insulted them, and they decided it would be a good opportunity to pay him a visit. “The Edens family was recognized as honorable and upright. But the men were tie hackers with independence and the masked band continued to hold that against them. There was a story also that further fuel was heaped on the enmity when either Charles Green or the younger Edens had shot and killed a dog with a rifle while hauling timber to Sparta. He wisecracked that he had ‘killed a Bald Knobber.’ To compare a person to a dog always was an opening for a fight in the hills.”Dave Walker called the men back. But whether they didn’t hear him or they chose not to listen, it did no good. Even after the group reached the cabin and found it empty, their momentum took them to Edens’ father’s house, where a bloody ambush resulted in William Edens and Charles Greene dead.Aftermath of the Murders
A newspaper sketch depicts the Christian County Bald Knobbers’ raid on the Edens cabin. (Courtesy of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch)
Prior to the Greene-Edens murders, there was a growing level of opposition to the group but their actions didn’t prompt much action from local law enforcement. The murders changed that reality. “The tragic events that took place inside James Edens’s cabin lasted only a few minutes, but they fundamentally altered the entire course of the Bald Knobber movement,” wrote Hernando. “Overnight the vigilantes had transformed themselves from righteous defenders of law and Christian morality into murderers, outlaws and social pariahs, an outcome that surely surprised many of them.”Christian County Sheriff Zachariah Johnson was responsible for finding the men suspected of the crimes. After locating Bald Knobber Joe Inman, the sheriff received a confession and information that led him to others who were said to be involved, ultimately rounding up 25 people in about a week. Later, a complicated ruse led to the capture of William Walker, who had escaped to Arkansas with the aid of family despite a leg being injured in the shootout. The men were eventually taken to Springfield, where the jail was more secure. After the construction of the “Bald Knobber Jail,” as a brick building on the Ozark square came to be known, they were returned to Ozark.“They also deputized many local residents of Ozark and the surrounding area to assist law enforcement officials in providing security,” penned Hernando. “Years later one such resident, Andrew Jackson Whitehead, recalled that local authorities deputized around 100 men to serve as guards at the jail because they believed that ‘some organized effort might be made by the Bald Knobbers to rescue the four condemned men.”The confinement of so many men led to challenges for their families, and at one point several were camped near the courthouse. The Springfield Republican noted that there were about 30 people in the camp, a group that included the wives of about a dozen Bald Knobbers. “Many of these women have found it very difficult to make both ends meet since the 15th of last March, when their husbands, fathers, brothers or sons, as the case may be, were arrested,” the paper noted. “Mrs. Elizabeth Mathews and Mrs. Rachel Mathews and two or three others have been obliged to cut ties and posts and do other heavy work, fitted only for the brawny arms of men. “‘We have just had to do it or starve,’ said Mrs. Elizabeth Mathews. ‘Even then part of the time we were on half rations. Very few of us have any homes, and we have to do any sort of work. Rachel can make eight or ten ties a day, but lots of times they’d cull out half of them; so you see there’s mighty little money in it.’ Gradually, many of the arrested men gave confessions, leaving four to pay for the crime: “Bull Creek” Dave Walker; William Walker, his son; John Matthews; and Wiley Matthews, his nephew. They were sentenced to hang, but remained in jail as the case was appealed.
A jail was built in Ozark to house the Bald Knobbers. It was torn down in 1929. (Clipping courtesy of Wayne Glenn)
At least some of them did. The Matthewses ultimately broke through a wall of the jail and escaped in December 1888. John Matthews was captured and returned to jail, while lore says that Wiley Matthews headed for Oklahoma. He was never recaptured. The Walkers chose not to escape.But let’s go back to Taney County for just a moment. A few months earlier, another Bald Knobber met his end: Nat Kinney, leader of the Taney County group, was shot and killed by anti-Bald Knobber William (Billy) Miles.“From 1884 to the breaking up of the Bald Knob gang, Kinney was king of the boldest band of outlaws that ever disgraced the Southwest,” noted the Joplin Herald in 1888. The story was published in many papers across the state. “His first individual murder was the killing of Andrew Cogburn at a church near Ozark on Sunday, March 12, 1886. After this numerous outrages were charged to him and his death is hailed with as much joy by the anti-Knobbers as it is with the frenzied sorrow by members of the old band.”The trouble escalated the following year, when Sheriff Branson was also killed by Miles.“Three hundred armed men are out day and night hunting William Mil(es), who killed Sheriff Br(a)nson, of Taney County, on the 4th of July,” noted the Kansas City Journal in July 1889. “The people all seem to think that the trouble has just commenced and the old grudges that existed between the Bald Knobbers and anti-Baldknobbers will be taken up again and Taney Countians will again take up arms against one another and have a war between themselves.”The Bald Knobber HangingsBack in Ozark, by the time this article was printed, the Walkers and John Matthews were dead. They were hanged in May 1889 on the Ozark square.Newspapers account the hours before the hanging. The elder Walker was resigned to his fate, while John Matthews voiced his innocence until the end. In the hours before the three men were led from the jail, William Walker decided he wanted to be baptized. “An ordinary bath tub was taken into the jail and filled with water and everything ready for immersion,” noted the Springfield Leader. When the minister asked to perform the ritual didn’t arrive, “Rev. Mr. Horn of the M.E. church, South, and Rev. Mr. Grayson of the Missionary Baptists, performing the ceremonies, during which the Walkers and John Matthews prayed with earnestness and fervor.” Religious services were held that night, continuing until 10 p.m. “The Walkers maintained the same fortitude that has characterized them throughout the ordeal but Matthews gives way to grief and repining, the paper continued. “They all maintain innocence of intention of committing murder when they went to the house of Edens, but refuse all efforts to induce them to make confession or statements.”The night was lit by a bright full moon, the paper noted. The next morning, people began arriving – but not, the paper noted, all that many from Christian County. By then, reports note many locals’ opinions had softened on the situation. And for others, it was personal. “A few days before the execution, Mr. Johnson (Christian County sheriff) went to the doomed men and told them he was going to employ a man from St. Louis to act as hangman in his stead as he had been a lifelong friend of the prisoners and that it was more than he could stand to place the noose around their necks,” noted the Ralls County Record in March 1913. The prisoners refused that idea.
A marker once stood on the Ozark square to mark where the Bald Knobbers were hanged in 1889. (Courtesy of Missouri State University Libraries)
At approximately 9:35 a.m., the men were escorted to the gallows. “The two Walkers stepped firmly, calmly, resolutely – Mathews lingered on the steps and exhorted the beholders to act and walk in the light of God and avoid evil associates which had brought him to this,” noted the Leader. “Prayers were offered and hymns were sung in which the condemned joined.” The hanging killed the elder Walker and Mathews quickly. However, William Walker did not transition easily.The rope with which he was hanged stretched when he dropped, resulting in his feet touching on the ground and the noose partially slipping off his head. He was hanged a second time. “The accident that befell William Walker could not be attributed to Sheriff Johnson, who took all human precaution but not being a professional hangman he could not be expected to be perfect. It is a strong argument in favor of the bill now pending in the legislature requiring all executions to be in the State penitentiary.” Aftermath Even though the groups in Taney and Christian counties formally ended by 1890, there are reports of Bald Knobber activities occurring later than that time. One example is in Douglas County, where Copeland recalls a man he knew in the 1970s, then in his 80s. Originally from western Douglas County, the man was well aware of Bald Knobber activities. “I said, ‘Have you ever heard of the Bald Knobbers?’ He was like, ‘Oh yeah — they were doing their thing well into the 1920s.’”Regardless of activities, the Bald Knobbers found a couple of PR boosts in the first third of the 20th century through “The Shepherd of the Hills,” a novel by Harold Bell Wright, that was published in 1907.
Visitors still come to Old Matt’s Cabin, a location in “The Shepherd of the Hills.”
They also appeared in a lost version of a film by the same name in 1913. The film was extremely controversial, and bans were attempted in Springfield by the local censorship board. Feelings were so strong by some that the creator was actually arrested (and later released). “The board of censors … were of the unanimous opinion tha tthe pictures, in their delineation of outlawry, cruelty and lawlessness would have a harmful effect on the young people of the city,” noted the Springfield Republican in June 1913. “The censors also believed that the pictures would give Missouri and the Ozarks a great deal of unfavorable advertising, and should be suppressed for that reason, if no other.”As of 2025, it’s presumed that the films have been lost to time. Attorney W.L. Vandeventer wrote about the vigilantes. But another big literary moment was in 1939, when Lucile Morris Upton’s “Bald Knobbers” book was published. The book by the local journalist represented 15 years of work and interviews – with primary sources who recalled that era firsthand – and was not told so much as a history book but as a novel that told the story in an engaging way.
Lucile Morris Upton is shown with Mary Elizabeth Mahnkey, a well-known Ozarks poet whose father, Alanzo Prather, was a Bald Knobber. (Courtesy of the Springfield-Greene County Library District)
“That turbulent story is one to which I have devoted sincere effort in the search for accuracy,” Upton wrote in the book’s foreword. “Some pioneers will disagree with bits of the story as I have related it. To them I can only reply that I have done my best to discover all versions and choose the one which appeared true.“The old timers also hold few hatreds. Most of them do not like to talk of the turbulent times when night riders lighted their signal fires on high bald peaks. That is due more to the misunderstanding with which the world has looked upon the Bald Knobbers than to any apology the survivors hold for connection with the organization.” Some 20 years later, the Baldknobbers music group debuted in Branson. They chose their moniker not because of any ties with the vigilantes, but because of its local recognition through “The Shepherd of the Hills.” “Lots of people read the book,” Bob Mabe, one of the group’s founding members, said in an oral history interview in 2018. “I just chose the name ‘Baldknobbers’ because of that. We weren’t vigilantes – we were just musicians.”
White River Leader; May 18, 1962
Bald Knobbers were also featured in “Fire In The Hole,” a well-known amusement ride at Silver Dollar City. The ride, which was replaced in 2024, still features versions of the vigilantes. And, in 2017, another film was officially complete. This one, however, was not lost to time. “Baldknobber” premiered after years of work, many local folks’ involvement and shooting across the region, including some of the sites where Bald Knobber activities actually took place. Copeland was involved with that film as a cast member as well as in writing. A key takeaway: Feelings are still strong. “The thing about it is — there are still people who have the sentiments and people who still feel strongly about which side they were on,” Copeland said.An example is over in Christian County, where a few years ago I visited with David House, who is related to David and William Walker, two of the condemned Bald Knobbers.“My name is William David House. I'm named after these guys,” he said. “I think David Walker’s brother Gatson Walker – Gat Walker – would have been the lineage that I come directly from on my mother’s side. My mother’s maiden name was Walker.”We drove along to see landmarks that join our world with that of the Bald Knobbers (some of which are on private property, so please do not trespass). One is the cave where the group met that’s between Chadwick and Sparta.“See where these trees are at, where this hollow is? You go right down in there and there is a bluff with a very small cave on it,” he told me. “And they met at kind of a little hollow there.” Another is the Fairview Church, close to where a cabin once stood that was important in Walker family lore. “When I was a boy, my grandfather – Lloyd Walker – and I were squirrel hunting out here,” Walker said. “He took me to some fallen-down remnants of what had been a cabin. I doubt if I could even find it now if it was still there. But he pointed it out to me and said, ‘This is where the sheriff came to arrest Uncle David.’” Land on Fairview Ridge in general is a pain point for the family. “From what I understand, the lawyer they hired to represent both of them at the murder trial – they had agreed to sign off the land that was out here in the Fairview Ridge,” House said. “I think David Walker’s wife and the remainder of the children were allowed to live there, but the attorney owned the property thereafter. “I would say it caused quite a bit of hardship for them. Of course, there was the stigma that she was the widow of an executed murderer, even though (he wasn’t there). Having children of my own, I can’t imagine how it would be to know that one of my children had been executed.”And then there’s the cemeteries where John Matthews and the Walkers are buried. The latter two are in Sparta, tucked unassumingly near the intersection of Highway 125 and 14 in the small Christian County town. History is close. Folks like Marie Day know this, too. The nearly 90-year-old Christian County historian said that when she began conducting research years ago, folks didn’t want to talk about the Bald Knobbers at all. Tensions, even years later, were too hot. “I talked to different people for stories, and I said, ‘OK, what about the Bald Knobbers?’ Most of them wouldn’t even talk about them. And that was in 1983,” said Marie Day, the Christian County historian. “It was too sensitive at that time. They just didn’t talk about them.”Resources“Alf Bolin: Just the Facts, Part II,” Larry Wood, Missouri and Ozarks History, accessed Aug. 11, 2025”Bald Knobber,” Lucile Morris Upton, 1939 “Bald-Knobbers” at Marshfield,” Springfield Daily Leader, Sept. 22, 1886“Bald Knobbers visit Chadwick, Mo.” Pineville News, Nov. 10, 1886“Captain Kinney did not organization Bald Knobbers,” Floyd Sullivan, Springfield Press, Aug. 16, 1930”Captain of Bald Knobbers breaks long silence,” Springfield Press, March 15, 1930“Had a good effect,” The Daily Tribune, April 14, 1886“Hanged!” The Springfield Leader, May 16, 1889”Kinney Killed,” Joplin Herald, Aug. 23, 1888”Laid to Anti-Bald-Knobbers,” Kansas City Times, Dec. 15, 1886No headline, Lexington Register, April 23, 1885No headline, Pineville News, Aug. 26, 1885No headline, The State Journal, April 9, 1886No headline, The Daily Tribune, April 23, 1886”Old jail where three ‘Bald Knobbers’ were hanged in 1889 to be torn down,” Unterrified Democrat, Feb. 21, 1929”Ozark bandit scenes make more trouble,” Springfield Republican, June 27, 1913“The pathetic side,” Springfield Republican, Aug. 25, 1887”Recalls days of Bald Knobbers,” Ralls County Record, March 21, 1913“Who the heck was Alf Bolin?,” Vickie Hooper, Bittersweet, Spring 1983 “W.L. Vandeventer talks of Bald Knobbers,” Christian County Republican, Dec. 19, 1935
Archived URL: https://www.ozarksalive.com/stories/the-real-story-behind-the-bald-knobbers
�� CONTENT HASHES:
SHA-256: b28622c615b5c48eef2e66214c9a0dab8975fbe1500395b0126a34104d560b9e
BLAKE2b: 82666b55cfb4cc963f2fbeeedb7680d090e7148a24187ee1fd520f56037d40aa
MD5: 9e7726ee4d14c519106f856c93114683
�� TITLE HASHES:
SHA-256: 38c3b8421cb51f4e5e5bb5a4177d503f182b51c801ebf183158fded140bc2c92
BLAKE2b: d34671de0a5bb12089569d24bb3b46d9c100bf0b8f47a86402ab893bd4f2cd54
MD5: bdba601f906a4bdf6cf52ea344f19607
�� INTEGRITY HASHES:
SHA-256: 589e68385f14b205f3bb0276f2e7c181efadc847a1a6af3665bc36ef88d40a21
BLAKE2b: 3c6de13847cd0a3b0486819bf53a110c727b327e74b00d86615243d2cc3fd56e
MD5: a8e1e175988ac451e7a1c7bfb316d221
Archived with ArcHive - Client-side cryptographic archival system