Kingdom of Devils: A Tale of Murder in the Shadow of the American Revolution
Language: English
Published by Random House USA Inc, 2026
- Hardcover
- Used
Seller: World of Books (was SecondSale), Montgomery, IL, U.S.A.World of Books (was SecondSale)
AbeBooks seller since December 20, 2007
Condition: Used - Very good
£ 17.52
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Add to basketItem description from seller
The chilling true story of a brutal string of deaths on the post-Revolutionary frontier that reveal the violence at the heart of the young United States "In Cold Blood for the 1790s . . . Part true crime, part western, part ghost story, Kingdom of Devils plumbs the dark underbelly of the American West in the years following the Revolution."--Jane Kamensky, president and CEO, Thomas Jefferson's Monticello Kentucky, 1798: A harrowing series of murders begins. The first body, discovered by cattle drovers, lies bloody at the bottom of a ridge. Then another--a dead boy staring up from a sinkhole. Bodies turn up along roadsides, stuffed into brush. They float to the surface of muddy brooks. For nine terrifying months, over hundreds of miles of Kentucky and Tennessee countryside, the terror unfolds. The killers--two men with hazy backgrounds--are brothers, named Wiley and Micajah Harp. The Harps killed dozens, but why they did it has eluded folklorists and historians for generations. Almost every story imagines that their motive was pure bloodlust, but for historian Katherine Grandjean, that's too simple. Instead, she uses the Harp murders to reveal the dark side of the young United States' independence. These were uncertain and dangerous years--a time when the fledgling federal government could do little to protect its citizens. And if the American Revolution was liberating, it was also deeply destabilizing, politically and socially. Even as it built up some men, it stacked the deck against others, punishing them with volatile markets, lost safety nets, and shattered aspirations. Unspooling the mystery of what sent the Harps reeling exposes the hidden, violent legacies of the revolutionary era. Bristling with tense, page-turning storytelling--and driven by a historian's obsessive detective work--Kingdom of Devils recovers these long-forgotten murders as a haunting tale about the darkness at the heart of the American dream.…
Seller Inventory # 00110406450
- Title
- Kingdom of Devils: A Tale of Murder in the Shadow of the American Revolution
- Author
- Katherine Grandjean
- Publisher
- Random House USA Inc
- Publication year
- 2026
- Condition
- Very Good
- Binding
- Hardback
- Language
- English
- ISBN 10
- 0593729935
- ISBN 13
- 9780593729939
No one knew Wiley Harp's name in 1797 as he stood in line at the Knoxville Courthouse to register the deed for his new farm, and no one could have imagined how horrifyingly his life would unravel from there. Less than two years from that orderly day, Wiley and his brother, Micajah, having spiraled into debt, would commit a series of murders, their grisly scenes scattered over hundreds of miles of Tennessee and Kentucky countryside. Bodies turned up along roadsides, stuffed into brush. They floated to the surface of muddy brooks. For nine terrifying months, from late 1798 to August 1799, as the Harps rained hell on society and confounded sheriffs, hillsides and rivers kept coughing up the dead.
The Harps killed dozens that year, but why they did it has eluded folklorists and historians for generations. Almost every story imagines that they were motivated by pure bloodlust, but to historian Katherine Grandjean, that's too simple an answer. In Kingdom of Devils, Grandjean uses the story of the Harp murders to scrutinize the triumphant spirit of the early United States and reveal that independence did not make every man a winner. There were dark sides to the country's recent victory. The Revolution was deeply destabilizing, politically and socially, shaking people free from their families and villages. Even as it built up hope for every man's success, it stacked the deck against them with the combination of volatile markets and the absence of any safety net for those who fell on hard times, fueling anger and resentment. Unspooling the mystery of what sent the Harps reeling exposes the hidden, violent legacies of the American Revolution.
For decades, the Harps lived on in folk songs and stories--until the Civil War exploded American society once again, and their names faded to history. But, in Kingdom of Devils, the Harps are revived as a cautionary tale about the darkness at the heart of the American dream.
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World of Books (was SecondSale)
Montgomery, IL, U.S.A.
AbeBooks seller since December 20, 2007
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