Barrackville, Marion County WV (history)

The following paragraph is on page 40 in the book "A History of Marion County, West Virginia, 1985" published by the Marion County Historical Society, Inc. in 1986. This book has 2 pages with information about Barrackville (pages 40-42).

Barrackville was named for Henry Barrick, who established a blacksmith shop about half a mile up Finches Run from the covered bridge in 1810. Henry and his son John operated the shop together until Henry's death in 1866. John continued the business until 1886. The Barricks are said to have made the bolts used in the covered bridge in 1853. The name "Barrackville" was first given the area north of Buffalo Creek where the Barricks lived sometime after the death of Henry in 1866. We have been unable to establish an exact date, but an old map shows the area north of Buffalo Creek as "Barrackville" and south of the creek as "Blairsburg."

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The second-oldest covered bridge in West Virginia is located within the town of Barrackville. During the Civil War, Confederate General William E. Jones crossed the Barrackville Bridge during his raid of Northern Virginia and ordered the bridge to be burned. Fortunately, he was able to be dissuaded by a local couple, William and Dolly Ice of Ice's Mill. Because of its unique engineering and the important role it played in the Civil War, the Barrackville Bridge was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.

There is an Historical Marker near the Barrackville Covered Bridge which reads:

This covered bridge, built in 1853 by Eli and Lemuel Chenoweth, West Virginia's pioneer bridge builders, is an excellent example of a modified Burr Truss and is in substantially original condition. The bridge was saved from destruction during Jones' Raid, April 29, 1863, by the Ice family, nearby mill owners and Southern sympathizers. It's the only covered bridge in the state that bears its vehicular loads with essentially no modern reinforcement.

The Barrackville Covered Bridge was restored in 1999. Care was taken to ensure that all repairs correspond to the bridge's original design.

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