Wiley Harpe

Wiley ("Little") Harpe and his brother, "Big Harpe," were notorious for the many crimes they committed during the late 18th century in the area of the frontier that included northern Mississippi; it is possible that they killed as many as fifty people before they were separately executed in 1799 and 1804. In the prose section of Act I, the narrative rejects the idea that the Harpes were among the unnamed bandits who were captured and held briefly in the settlement jail, because "the Harpes . . . were dead or scattered by this time" (5); but in the prose of Act III the legend that "Wiley Harpe" may have been a prisoner in the jail is resurrected (196).