The Harp(e) brothers have been called America’s first serial killers, once notorious enough to be the stuff of folklore and legend before fading into obscurity. In the chaos of the post-Revolutionary frontier, the two men committed dozens of murders across Kentucky and Tennessee, their wives traveling alongside them the entire time.
My guest is Katherine Grandjean, author of Kingdom of Devils: A Tale of Murder in the Shadow of the American Revolution, out now. She explains how the desperation of frontier life might have pushed two ordinary men toward violence, and what their story reveals about the darker side of the years following the American Revolution.
The author’s publisher page: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/2289902/katherine-grandjean/