Stumps vs. Bumpeses
Tales from an Appalachian Courtroom…The courtroom was almost empty, but in the front row were arrayed the defendants. On the left side was the Stump family, with Maw and Paw sprawled in the center seats and the freshly scrubbed kids and kinfolk gathered around them.
They glared daggers across the aisle at the Bumpus clan, similarly circled protectively around their matriarch and patriarch. All were dressed in their best Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes. They glared back at the Stumps. The little kids stuck out their tongues. The young men shook fists.
“I’ll have none of that now!” declared my friend, the judge. He had tipped off my Appalachia newspaper that this might be an interesting story: a Hatfields vs. McCoys family feud that he intended to put to rest once and for all.
Everybody in the community – especially local law enforcement personnel – knew of the Stump and Bumpus families. They resided in a mobile home park on the outskirts of town, surviving neither on industriousness nor business skill. None of the family members were gainfully employed, and you couldn’t hire them to perform odd-jobs.
They had time to hunt, fish, and collect junk. However, when it came to work, they complained of an epidemic of bad backs.
On most days during warm weather, Grandpa Stump and Paw-Paw Bumpus could be found playing checkers under a Chinaberry tree. Something about the spreading shade of the tree caused time to slow down in the yard between the two family residences. The old men might not make one move an hour on the faded black-and-red squared board.
Their sons and nephews hung around, smoking and making sure neither of the checker players had fallen asleep or expired. They were often somnolent themselves. While driving past on my daily rounds, I many times witnessed an entire tableau of Bumpuses and Stumps motionless in the yard. They were even too lazy to wave.
The routine was prone to become more energetic on weekends when, despite their apparent lack of funds, the clans hosted barbecues and beer bashes. The old men still sat in the shade and slowly moved their checkers across squares, but the families cranked up to smoke pork shoulders and get soused.
The Bumpuses and Stumps included some mean drunks. Fights would break out, necessitating a raid by the Sheriff’s Department. Jugs of moonshine were confiscated; a couple of the young men would be hauled to jail for the night; but on Sunday morning, they’d all be in church together, hugging in friendship and praising the Lord.
That is, except for the Sunday after the Saturday night melee that resulted in multiple arrests from both families and the assault of 90-year-old Granny Stump.
This was what caused the judge’s concern. “When old ladies and children are not safe, the judicial system must intervene,” he lectured before calling the first witness, Lester Bumpus.
Lester testified that on the day of the ruckus, everything was normal until the never-ending checker game was interrupted by a new son-in-law who had the temerity to ask, “Who’s the best checker player?”
Stumps looked at Bumpuses; Bumpuses looked back. Someone took a long guzzzle on a bottle and belched. Then, the fateful words were uttered, “Paw-Paw, he ain’t never been beat.”
“Tain’t so,” objected a loyal grandson. “Grandpa Stump’s the best!”
Of course, the declarations of checker supremacy accelerated into challenges, cursing, pushing, and then, according to Lester, “That idgit Coy Stump took a poke at me.”
The weekend picnic devolved into knots of fighting Bumpuses and Stumps. The sheriff’s deputies who arrived testified it looked like a European soccer match riot.
Granny Stump, a frail-looking old lady with a black eye, took the stand. She related that the swirling fracas had engulfed her. “Next thing I knew, I wuz on the ground a-seein’ stars!” she cried, dabbing her sore eye.
Finally, the assailant was sworn. Reno Bumpus (he had a sister named Las Vegas and a brother named Nevada) did not deny that he had caused Granny Stump’s shiner.
“Don’t you realize,” warned the stern judge, “that she might have been killed or badly injured?”
Reno was wide-eyed and denied malicious intent.
“Then, tell us in your own words what happened,” ordered the judge.
“First off, Granny Stump ain’t telling the whole story. She jumped in the fight and started lumping people over the head with a skillet! I heard Grandpa Stump holler, ‘Git that ol’ biddy out-a here a-fore she hurts somebody, least ways herself!’ I grabbed her by the laig, and the next thing I knowed, she came up a-swingin’ that fryin’ pan…”
Sobbing, Reno threw himself on the mercy of the court.
“Jedge, I had to pertect ma-self. I just tapped her light-like, then dragged her out of the pile. But she set right up and commenced to cussing and flailing with that pan. She liked to have split her own nephew’s skull-bone,” he said, pointing to a bruised and battered Stump with a goose egg-sized knot on his noggin.
“She’s a feisty ol’ woman, for sure.”
By this time, the judge had tears in his eyes, but it was from efforts to keep from laughing out loud.
“Mrs. Stump, what punishment do you think is appropriate for the man who admits this assault? Shall the court order the maximum penalty under law, including incarceration and fines, for willful and wanton violence?”
Granny considered for a moment and said, “Just tell him I want my skillet back.”
The charges were dismissed: Bumpus against Stump and vice versa. The judge preached a little sermon on brotherly love, had the former foes hanging around each other’s necks. He sent them forth to do no more evil to themselves or senior citizens. But before they filed from the courtroom, he asked, “By the way, I don’t see Paw-Paw Bumpus or Grandpa Stump among you. Where are they?”
Reno peered at the judge with barely disguised astonishment: “Why, yer Honor, they’re back at home, a-playin’ checkers.”
