NEW RIVER COALFIELD
The most outstanding feature of this field was the main line of the C&O Railroad running through it, and of course the non-navagable New River itself. There was also a connection with the Virginian Railway to the west of Oak Hill, and some New River Coalfield production did go out to market on their rails, too. Mining was chiefly in the low-volitale Fire Creek and Sewell Seams. The New River Coalfield was the chief producer of beehive coke in Southern West Virginia before the 1890s and after the 1920s. In the interim period it was second to the Pocahontas Coalfield.
Commercial mining in the coalfield began in the 1870s. At first English and Scottish immigrants were imported to dig the coal. Later, Southern Europeans (locally called "hunks") settled in the coal camps along Dunloup and White Oak Creeks. In the latter years a large number of the miners in the New River Gorge were African-Americans.
This coal field went into decline after World War 2. I am not aware of any major active mines in the area anymore. The New River Field, which burned brightly like a lump of Sewell coal for over 100 years, burned out in the 1980s and '90s.
SCENES FROM THE NEW RIVER GORGE
History of coal mining. History of West Virginia. History of Kanawha County West Virginia. History of Fayette County
West Virginia. History of Raleigh County. History of Wyoming County. History
of McDowell County. History of Beckley WV. Pocahontas Coal Seam. Historic Pictures. Historic Photographs.
Historic books. Historic Maps. Bluefield History. Beckley history publications. History. Polish immigrants. Slovak immigrants. Italian immigrants.
West Virginia immigrants. Appalachian music. Appalachian culture.
Historic architecture. Historic buildings. Historic towns. Organized labor. Unions. United Mine workers. Archives.
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