Conflict between groups over natural resources in rural areas is one of the leading causes of violence in post-colonial countries. The really tricky thing is that the authorities that might solve these conflicts (the government) are often not very involved in rural areas, so things can get out of control very quickly. I am curious if anything similar happened in the history of the U.S., given its large agricultural base, waves of new immigrants, and the scarcity of government involvement in its Western areas.
By the 19th c., the colonies/states had already experienced and worked through many of these problems. Pre-industrial North America was agricultural: land was money, and establishing boundaries, rights and ownership of it incredibly important. Lands had been granted by monarchs with very little knowledge of geography, resulting in many disputes about boundaries ( between Maryland and Pennsylvania, for example, resulting in the famous Mason-Dixon survey). Similarly, property claims within those territories were often not well surveyed and registered. Like the Lord Fairfax grant in Virginia, in which Fairfax and the Governor of Virginia fought over the definition of the boundaries of his grant, with the Governor dispensing deeds to land speculators before it was even settled. The chaotic early rush into Kentucky and Tennessee territories after the Revolutionary War resulted in many "shingled" claims ( called shingled because deeds overlapped and overlaid each other). The State of Franklin briefly existed mostly because of a fight between North Carolina and Virginia land speculators over the new Tennessee ( and Cherokee) territories. The Land Ordnance of 1785 was enacted to make the survey and sale of land in the new western territories by the government more orderly, and because of that new states like Ohio had little trouble with shingled claims.
The government was involved in the rural areas. Settling land claims was a matter for the courts- no matter if the farmer as living far out in the woods, he was subject to the laws of the state or territory. But that was often a very complex and long process. Especially because as settlers would mostly be buying their land from agents and land speculators, they might not be aware of other claims. In 1846 the heirs of Matthias Bruen in New York inherited about 200,000 acres in what's now southern West Virginia from his 1796 land grant, and began to try to enforce their claims. But agents for the family had already sold a number of parcels earlier, and bordering properties were badly surveyed and registered. The occupants of the Bruen lands often had improved it- built houses, barns, fences, and cleared it- by the time the sheriff and the agents for the heirs showed up and told them to move. The Bruen heirs were even trying to enforce their claims in 1877, decades after people had settled on it. The result was a feud that lasted for decades., exacerbated by the Civil War.