Qualla: Princeton, West Virginia

Princeton, West Virginia: Introduction

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Coal town guy, CC BY-SA 3.0. Princeton was burned by its own side. On May 1, 1862, with Union troops advancing through Mercer County during the Civil War, Confederate Captain Walter Jenifer ordered the town torched to prevent the federal army from capturing the supplies stored there. According to local accounts, many Princeton residents lit their own homes themselves before walking away from the rubble. By the time the fire died down, almost no building was left standing. The Robert McNutt house survived - ironically, as the federal army then commandeered it for headquarters. After the war, residents shunned the new circuit judge, Nathaniel Harrison, for being a Confederate turncoat. Princeton would have to start over.

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Image: Coal town guy | CC BY-SA 3.0

Princeton, West Virginia: Reconstruction and the Long Wait

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Magnolia677, CC BY-SA 4.0. The new State of West Virginia was created in 1863, but Princeton and Mercer County had stayed loyal to the Confederacy, and they were not included in the original counties forming the new state. By the end of 1865 they were absorbed in anyway. Princeton slowly rebuilt during Rec...

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Image: Magnolia677 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Princeton, West Virginia: The Standard Oil Railroad

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brian M. Powell (user Bitmapped on en.wikipedia), CC BY-SA 3.0. The story of how the Virginian Railway got built sounds like financial fiction. In 1896, an engineer named William Nelson Page started building the Loup Creek and Deepwater Railway - a tiny logging line connecting a sawmill to the C&O mainline on the Kanawha River. He renamed it ...

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Image: Brian M. Powell (user Bitmapped on en.wikipedia) | CC BY-SA 3.0

Princeton, West Virginia: Tidewater, Deepwater, Victoria, Sewells Point

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Famartin, CC BY-SA 4.0. Instead of giving up, Page and Rogers expanded their plan. In Virginia, they incorporated a second railroad - the Tidewater Railway, officially based in Staunton on the C&O. But the Tidewater quietly surveyed and bought rights of way far from the C&O, paralleling the Norfolk and ...

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Image: Famartin | CC BY-SA 4.0

Princeton, West Virginia: Princeton, Headquarters of the New River Division

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sowvfella, CC BY-SA 4.0. Princeton was designated headquarters of the Virginian's New River Division. The town was incorporated on February 20, 1909, the same year the railroad opened. For the first half of the 20th century, the Virginian was an engineering marvel that ran on Standard Oil money - electri...

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Image: Sowvfella | CC BY-SA 4.0

Princeton, West Virginia: The Replica Station and the Plateau Town

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Princetonnative, CC BY 4.0. Princeton today is a city of about 5,872 people, the county seat of Mercer County, the heart of the Bluefield micropolitan area. The average altitude is 2,400 feet, with hills rising to 3,100 and dropping to 1,700 along the river valleys. Most strikingly, residents built a replic...

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Image: Princetonnative | CC BY 4.0