Appalachian History Series
Introduction
On the fog‑soaked morning of May 14 1892, rifle‑shots rang out atop Pound Gap on the Kentucky–Virginia line. Within minutes five members of moonshiner Ira “Bad Ira” Mullins’s caravan lay dead, another gravely wounded, and the gunmen slipped into the hardwood forest. Newspapers quickly dubbed the event the Pound Gap or Killing Rock Massacre, and regional headlines followed the hunt, trial, and hanging of the self‑styled preacher‑physician Dr. Marshall Benton “Doc” Taylor, soon known to Virginians as the Red Fox of the Mountains.
Moonshine, Taxation, and Armed Resistance in the Cumberland Highlands
Corn‑whiskey had served as back‑country currency since before the Civil War. The 1862 federal excise tax and post‑war “whisky rings,” however, criminalised thousands of small farmers. In the fiscal‑year 1890 Annual Report of Commissioner John W. Mason (not John G. Capers as sometimes repeated), more illicit stills were seized in Kentucky, Virginia, Tennessee, and North Carolina than in any other section. Entire creek valleys posted look‑outs—“watch‑dogs”—who rang cowbells whenever revenue men appeared. In editorials such as the Richmond Dispatch of June 14 1892, mountain residents complained that revenue raids “trample ancient rights of hospitality,” helping explain continued sympathy for the Mullins clan.
“Bad Ira” vs. the “Red Fox”: A Feud Takes Shape
Taylor first clashed with Mullins in July 1889, when a hastily deputised posse intercepted a Mullins wagon on the main street of Wise Courthouse; witnesses recalled hundreds of shots. Mullins—later crippled by a bullet through both hips—swore revenge, and legend insists he posted a $300 bounty for Taylor’s scalp (no contemporary paper has confirmed the figure). By spring 1892 both factions openly armed neighbours and kinsmen. Rumour said the Mullins wagon now carried almost $1,000 beneath Louranza Mullins’s skirts—irresistible temptation for Taylor’s band.
The Ambush at Killing Rock
Shortly before noon on May 14 1892 the Mullins party—seven people, two horses, and a wagon—crested Pound Gap. Behind a breast‑work of sandstone and freshly‑cut rhododendron, Taylor and brothers Henan and Calvin Fleming opened fire with .45‑calibre Winchesters at point‑blank range. Contemporary dispatches counted “no fewer than twenty wounds in old Mullins’s body,” and even the team animals were shot. Survivors were Jane Mullins (carrying an infant) and fourteen‑year‑old John H. Mullins, whose left arm was shattered. Locals soon christened the outcrop Killing Rock—a name that appears on today’s Red Fox Trail map.
Manhunt Through the Thickets
For ten weeks the killers evaded posses, leaving reversed‑heel “fox tracks” and sleeping in laurel hells. Railroad detectives finally arrested Taylor in an empty freight car at Bluefield, West Virginia, on August 18 1892. Fear gripped Wise and Letcher counties; Clerk of Court James S. Beverly telegraphed Governor Philip W. McKinney on June 3 1892 requesting militia protection. Two state companies were placed on 24‑hour notice but never deployed.
The Fleming brothers escaped north into West Virginia. On 23 January 1894 Deputy “Big Ed” Hall cornered them in the Boggs post‑office gun‑fight; Cal Fleming died in the doorway, Henan surrendered with a head wound. With key witness Jane Mullins dead of fever, a Wise County jury acquitted Henan in July 1895.
Courtroom Drama and the Gallows
Taylor’s trial opened in September 1893 but was moved 275 miles to Lynchburg for security. Ballistics proved decisive: investigators recovered rim‑fire .45 shells at Killing Rock, yet Taylor’s Winchester—admitted in evidence—fired centre‑fire rounds thanks to a home‑made firing‑pin conversion. After two hours’ deliberation the jury returned five counts of first‑degree murder. At 2:20 p.m. on 27 October 1893, the Red Fox mounted the Wise County gallows, sang two hymns, prophesied his own resurrection, and dropped through the trap. Crowds lingered until Monday “in case the prophecy proved true.”
Memory, Legend, and the New Appalachia
Coal camps, the Interstate railroad, and statewide Prohibition soon reshaped Wise County, but the Pound Gap ambush lingers in regional memory. Hikers on today’s Red Fox Trail still leave quartz pebbles at Killing Rock, and descendants of both clans hold joint memorials each May. The episode remains a violent milestone on Appalachia’s path from subsistence farming to a cash economy—proof that in the highlands the line between lawman and outlaw could be as thin as the barrel of a Winchester.
Sources & Further Reading
Richmond Dispatch — 14 June 1892; 18 August 1892
Big Stone Gap Post — 2 & 23 March 1893
Daily Star (Roanoke) — 22 July 1893
Wise County Circuit Court Minute Book E — Sept.–Oct. 1893
Deposition of Jane Mullins — 15 May 1892, Commonwealth’s Attorney Papers, Wise County Courthouse
Commissioner John W. Mason — Annual Report, 1890
Governor Philip W. McKinney Papers — Box 12, Library of Virginia
“The Killing Rock Massacre,” Appalachian History (2017)
Oakley Dean Baldwin, Killing “Moonshine” Mullins (2015)
U. S. Forest Service, Red Fox Trail wayside panel (2009)
Author Note: [Blank]