The feud was a culmination of several factors, but mostly resulted due to the local Sheriffs race that placed incumbent Sam Reese against former Deputy Larkin Hope.
However, on August 3, 1898, Constable Larkin Hope was shot and killed by an unknown assailant in downtown Columbus.
Jim Coleman, a close friend to Sheriff Reese's sons Walter and Herbert, was the initial suspect.
The citizens appealed to the city council to re-establish the office of Town Marshal, abolished some years earlier.
That same year, Will Clements was shot from ambush in Matagorda County, Texas by a man with whom he had had an altercation a few days earlier.