Appalachian Community Histories – Pineville, Bell County: Cumberland Ford, The Narrows, and a County Seat on the Cumberland River
Pineville sits in one of the most recognizable natural places in southeastern Kentucky. The town stands on the Cumberland River where the river cuts through Pine Mountain, at a passage long known as The Narrows. Before it was Pineville, before it was the Bell County seat, and before its courthouse square became the center of local government and commerce, the place was remembered as Cumberland Ford. The Kentucky Atlas identifies Pineville as the Bell County seat, settled in 1781 as Cumberland Ford, and located where the Cumberland River cuts through Pine Mountain.
That setting explains much of Pineville’s history. A ford was not just a shallow place in a river. In mountain country, it could decide where people crossed, where roads formed, where soldiers camped, where courts were placed, and where business gathered. The Advisory Council on Historic Preservation describes Cumberland Ford as a shallow crossing on the Cumberland River at The Narrows, a gap in Pine Mountain that became a key passage on the Wilderness Road into Kentucky.
Before Pineville
The older written story of this region reaches back into the colonial-era exploration of the Cumberland country. In 1750, Dr. Thomas Walker’s journal recorded his party moving through the country of creeks, rivers, Indian roads, buffalo traces, and mountain passages. On the seventeenth day of April, Walker wrote that Flat Creek and other streams joined a river that he called the Cumberland River. Later notes to the journal identify nearby Clover Creek as entering the Cumberland just above Pineville, where the river breaks through Pine Mountain.
Pineville’s later public history also connects the place to the road west. The Kentucky tourism account of Boone Trace notes that Pineville was tied both to The Narrows and to Cumberland Ford, where early pioneers and Native people crossed the Cumberland River before moving northward. It describes the settlement as one of Kentucky’s older communities, established in 1781 and first known as Cumberland Ford before the Pineville name came into use.
The National Register nomination for the Pineville Courthouse Square Historic District gives Abraham Buford as the first recorded settler on the site in 1781. It also connects the place to Evan Shelby, father of Kentucky’s first governor, Isaac Shelby, and to the early landholding story around Cumberland Ford.
Bell County and the County Seat
Bell County was created after the Civil War, when Kentucky’s mountain counties were being reshaped for government, courts, roads, and local administration. The official Bell County history states that the county was formed on February 5, 1867, from portions of Harlan and Knox Counties. It was first called Josh Bell County in honor of Joshua Fry Bell, a lawyer and congressman, and the name was shortened to Bell County by the Kentucky legislature on January 31, 1873.
The choice of Pineville as the county seat was not accidental. The National Register nomination records that the first county fiscal court met on September 9, 1867. In October of that year, a site was chosen for the county seat because there was no town within the limits of the new county. William North, Rufus Moss, and Enoch Bird were appointed to lay off a public square and provide for a courthouse. M. G. Jones was paid ten dollars to lay off the new town.
The place selected stood in the strip of land between the Cumberland River and the old Wilderness Road. In 1868, a tax was levied for public buildings. In 1869, J. J. Gibson Jr., who had inherited land that included the Cumberland Ford site and much of the bottom land south of the river, donated the site for the courthouse. The courthouse was completed by March 1871, and the jail was finished nearby in 1873.
Cumberland Ford Becomes Pineville
Names changed as the settlement became a town. The Kentucky Atlas states that the Cumberland Ford post office opened in 1818 and was renamed Pineville in 1870. The same source gives Pineville’s incorporation date as 1873.
The Pineville name did not erase Cumberland Ford. Instead, the two names mark different chapters of the same place. Cumberland Ford belongs to the era of river crossings, Native travel paths, hunters, explorers, and the Wilderness Road. Pineville belongs to the courthouse, the public square, the railroad age, local government, stores, banks, hotels, schools, and later preservation efforts.
The National Register nomination preserves some of the names tied to early Pineville. It lists early inhabitants such as Captain Bingham from Straight Creek, the Johnsons, Milton Unthank, Peter Hinkle of Barbourville, and T. J. Hoskins. Houses belonging to Bingham, Johnson, Unthank, Pursifull, Rise, Burchfield, and Moss appeared on the 1888 Pine Mountain Iron and Coal Company plat, while Hoskins operated a store on the road to The Narrows.
Coal, Lumber, and the Town Plan
The coal boom of the 1880s changed the pace of Pineville’s growth. The National Register nomination describes how coal development in eastern Kentucky quickened and expanded the small community at The Narrows. Middlesboro, southeast of Pineville, was planned by English investors as a major industrial center, while Pineville’s development was less ambitious but still deeply tied to the same mineral and transportation world.
The 1888 town plan remained visible in the modern street grid when the National Register nomination was prepared. The courthouse square stood within a planned grid, bordered by Virginia and Kentucky Avenues and Pine and Walnut Streets. Pine Street crossed through the floodwall and bridged the river toward the railroad depot and the Straight Creek communities, while Kentucky Avenue and Pine Street developed as important commercial routes.
A bridge over the Cumberland at Cumberland Ford was built in 1888, apparently to reach coal mines and coke ovens on Straight Creek. The following year, A. J. Asher built a sawmill at the mouth of Straight Creek. These details show Pineville not only as a courthouse town but also as a practical river and railroad community shaped by timber, coal, and access through the mountains.
Courthouse Square
The courthouse square became Pineville’s public center. The present Bell County Courthouse was designed by John W. Gaddis of Vincennes, Indiana, and built in 1919. The National Register nomination describes it as a three-story Classical Revival structure above a rusticated stone basement, with limestone Ionic porticoes, a clock in the tympanum, and the county name inscribed in the frieze. The building was extensively rehabilitated in 1978.
The courthouse was not the first one on the square. The National Register nomination states that an 1894 courthouse burned in 1914 and was replaced by the present Classical brick courthouse between 1919 and 1920. Around the square, other buildings reflected Pineville’s commercial growth, including the Continental Hotel, the Asher building, the Masonic Temple, and the Bell National Bank building.
The Pineville Courthouse Square Historic District was later listed in the National Register of Historic Places. The official NARA listing identifies the district along Kentucky, Pine, Virginia, and Walnut Streets, with a listing date of July 19, 1990. Its period of significance runs from 1888 to 1940, and its areas of significance are architecture and commerce.
A Town Built Beside Water
The same river crossing that gave Pineville its importance also gave it risk. The National Register nomination places Pineville on bottom land in a bend of the Cumberland River and notes that the town was surrounded by a high concrete floodwall in the mid-twentieth century because of repeated inundation.
That danger was part of a larger regional pattern. The National Weather Service account of the April 1977 East Kentucky flood describes torrential rains from April 2 through April 5, 1977, with record flooding on the upper Cumberland River and other rivers across southeastern Kentucky and nearby states. Bell County was among the Kentucky counties declared disaster areas.
In Pineville, the floodwall is more than an engineering feature. It is a reminder that the town’s history cannot be separated from the Cumberland. The river brought travelers, commerce, roads, and settlement. It also brought recurring floods that shaped how the town protected itself and how later generations remembered life beside the water.
Preserving the Old Town
By the late twentieth century, Pineville’s downtown had become both a historic resource and a preservation challenge. The National Register nomination noted that the city hoped listing the courthouse square would encourage investment and development in the commercial district through preservation incentives.
The Advisory Council on Historic Preservation later described Pineville’s revitalization work, including the role of historic properties and the Bell Theatre, built in 1939. The same account notes that Pineville’s annual Kentucky Mountain Laurel Festival was created in 1933 and that the city was designated a Preserve America Community in April 2005.
The Bell County Historical Society continues part of that preservation work. The society describes its purpose as the collection and preservation of historical documents, photographs, and artifacts from the Cumberland Gap area, including the adjacent Harlan and Knox County areas from which Bell County was formed.
Pineville’s Place in Appalachian History
Pineville’s story is not only the story of a courthouse town. It is a story of geography becoming history. The Cumberland River, The Narrows, Pine Mountain, the old ford, the Wilderness Road, the courthouse square, the coal boom, the floodwall, and the preserved downtown all belong to the same long thread.
The town began as a crossing. It became a county seat. It grew into a commercial center for a mountain county shaped by coal, timber, law, travel, and memory. Pineville still carries the older name of Cumberland Ford in its landscape, even as the courthouse, square, streets, and festivals tell the later story of a community that learned to live where river, road, and mountain meet.
Sources & Further Reading
Advisory Council on Historic Preservation. “Pineville, Kentucky.” Preserve America Communities. https://www.achp.gov/preserve-america/community/pineville-kentucky
Appalachian Regional Commission. “Kentucky.” https://www.arc.gov/appalachian-states/kentucky/
Bell County Clerk’s Office. “Bell County Clerk’s Office.” https://bellcountyclerk.ky.gov/
Bell County Clerk’s Office. “Records.” https://bellcountyclerk.ky.gov/records/
Bell County, Kentucky. “About Us.” https://bellcounty.ky.gov/Pages/about.aspx
Bell County, Kentucky. “County Offices.” https://bellcounty.ky.gov/elected/Pages/default.aspx
Bell County Historical Society. “Home.” https://www.bellcountyhistorical.org/
Bell County Public Library District. “Bell County Public Library.” https://www.bellcpl.org/
Census Bureau, United States. “Gazetteer Files.” https://www.census.gov/geographies/reference-files/time-series/geo/gazetteer-files.html
Census Bureau, United States. “Gazetteer Files: 2020.” https://www.census.gov/geographies/reference-files/2020/geo/gazetter-file.html
Cornett, Tim L. Bell County, Kentucky: A Brief History. Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2009. https://www.arcadiapublishing.com/products/9781596298097
FamilySearch. “Bell County, Kentucky Genealogy.” https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Bell_County%2C_Kentucky_Genealogy
FamilySearch. “Marriage Records, 1867–1976.” FamilySearch Catalog. https://www.familysearch.org/en/search/catalog/120555
FamilySearch. “Records of Land Sold for Taxes, 1877–1927.” FamilySearch Catalog. https://www.familysearch.org/search/catalog/674593
FamilySearch. “Wills, 1869–1920.” FamilySearch Catalog. https://www.familysearch.org/search/catalog/127641
Froelich, Albert J., and James F. Tazelaar. Geologic Map of the Pineville Quadrangle, Bell and Knox Counties, Kentucky. U.S. Geological Survey Geologic Quadrangle Map GQ-1129, 1974. https://doi.org/10.3133/gq1129
Fuson, Henry Harvey. History of Bell County, Kentucky. Louisville, KY: Roberts Printing Company, 1947. https://www.familysearch.org/search/catalog/168814
Kentucky Atlas and Gazetteer. “Pineville, Kentucky.” https://www.kyatlas.com/ky-pineville.html
Kentucky Court of Justice. “Bell County.” https://kycourts.gov/Courts/County-Information/Pages/Bell.aspx
Kentucky Historical Society. “Cumberland Ford.” ExploreKYHistory. https://explorekyhistory.ky.gov/items/show/415
Kentucky Historical Society. “Invasion and Retreat.” Historical Marker Database. https://history.ky.gov/markers/invasion-and-retreat
Kentucky Historical Society. “Joshua Fry Bell.” Historical Marker Database. https://history.ky.gov/markers/joshua-fry-bell
Kentucky Historical Society. “Naming of the Cumberland River.” ExploreKYHistory. https://explorekyhistory.ky.gov/items/show/412
Kentucky Historical Society. “Wallsend Mine.” Historical Marker Database. https://history.ky.gov/markers/wallsend-mine
Kentucky Historical Society. “Wilderness Road.” Historical Marker Database. https://history.ky.gov/markers/wilderness-road
Kentucky Historical Society. “Bell County Court House, Pineville, Kentucky.” Digital Collections. https://www.kyhistory.com/digital/collection/PH/id/10550/
Kentucky Geological Survey. “Topography.” Bell County Groundwater Resources. https://www.uky.edu/KGS/water/library/gwatlas/Bell/belltopo.html
Library of Congress. “About This Collection: Sanborn Maps.” https://www.loc.gov/collections/sanborn-maps/about-this-collection/
Library of Congress. “Ida Red.” Alan Lomax Collection. https://www.loc.gov/item/afc9999005.9391/
National Archives and Records Administration. “1900 Federal Population Census, Part 1.” https://www.archives.gov/research/census/microfilm-catalog/1900/part-01
National Park Service. “Cumberland Gap.” Cumberland Gap National Historical Park. https://www.nps.gov/cuga/learn/historyculture/cumberland-gap.htm
National Park Service. Pineville Courthouse Square Historic District. National Register of Historic Places Registration Form. https://npgallery.nps.gov/pdfhost/docs/NRHP/Text/90001019.pdf
National Weather Service. “April 1977 East Kentucky Flood.” https://www.weather.gov/jkl/1977flood
Rennick, Robert M. “The Post Offices of Bell County, Kentucky.” Morehead State University ScholarWorks, 2000. https://scholarworks.moreheadstate.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1382&context=kentucky_county_histories
Secretary of State, Kentucky. “Land Office.” https://www.sos.ky.gov/land/Pages/default.aspx
U.S. Geological Survey. “TopoView.” https://ngmdb.usgs.gov/topoview/
U.S. Geological Survey. “Geologic Map of the Pineville Quadrangle, Bell and Knox Counties, Kentucky.” Publications Warehouse. https://pubs.usgs.gov/publication/gq1129
Walker, Thomas. “Journal of an Exploration in the Spring of the Year 1750.” Tennessee GenWeb transcription. https://www.tngenweb.org/tnland/squabble/walker.html
Author Note: Pineville is one of those Bell County places where the landscape explains the history before the records even begin. The courthouse square, Cumberland Ford, The Narrows, and the river all show why this town became more than just another stop in the mountains.