West Virginia is brimming with goodness and beauty, including stunning mountain views and charming small towns that are famous throughout the country. But our state also hides its share of shameful, dark secrets. Like every community, there are unseemly and criminal aspects of everyday life that peek through even the squeaky cleanest of histories. These incidents in particular have a lot to say about our country’s history, and its current state. One of the most creepy places in West Virginia is the Dingess Tunnel in Dingess, WV. Some terrible things have taken place in this little Mingo County spot’s history.
Tucked away in the remote mountains of southwestern West Virginia in Mingo County is the small community of Dingess, WV. Here you'll find a spread of historic and contemporary homes and lots of natural beauty in the landscape.
Check before you enter to make sure you don't see any headlights coming toward you, because you don't want to meet another car somewhere in the middle of that long, narrow stretch of brick! Truly, even today, there is no light or other way of mitigating traffic other than to hope for the best.
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Though the mile-long Dingess Tunnel in West Virginia is unnerving (to say the least), and is still the best way to get into Dingess to this day, it was extremely well-made. It's 3,331 feet long and has natural airflow ventilation and a drainage ditch to the east side.
Dingess, WV has a history dating back to the pioneer days, when it was named after pioneer settler William Anderson Dingess. But it also has coal and railroad history, too... and what a bleak and disappointing history it is.
In days past, Dingess, WV earned the reputation for being one of the most lawless spots in the land. Rumor has it that it wasn't uncommon for this small community to have a killing once a month. Unfortunately, this reputation didn't do much to attract upstanding citizens. Reform wasn't even on the minds of the area's inhabitants.
From 1900 to 1972, at least 17 lawmen were killed in the area's Twelve Pole Creek region - shot to death while attempting to keep order. It wasn't just Dingess that had issues with the law. In neighboring Matewan, also in Mingo County, there was an enormous shootout between outlaws and lawmen, resulting in many deaths. This was eventually dubbed the Matewan Massacre.
And to make this lawlessness doubly tragic, much of it was racially-motivated. The secluded community was emphatic about not welcoming outsiders who came to work at the mine or the railroad.
That meant anyone they didn't know or weren't comfortable with, but especially people who didn't look like them. And unfortunately, they weren't just planning to yell visitors off the land. Their methods of removing outsiders were a lot more permanent than that.
According to the tales, African Americans and Chinese immigrants suffered the worst of the abuse, as they would often face hostile locals waiting at either end of the tunnel with guns, ready to shoot anyone who looked different than the homogeneous local population. Or, these outlaws would ambush trains and do the same with any "outsiders" among the passengers.
In that way, that mile-long Dingess Tunnel in West Virginia began to look an awful lot like a mile-long walk to the gallows. As if the fear of crashing into someone in another car weren't enough of an issue!
These crimes and more (including a train collision or two) still haunt the area and earned the tunnel its terrible nickname: "Bloody Mingo." If you ever head to Dingess to experience the tunnel for yourself, be ready for a thrill ride as you squeeze narrowly through this tunnel by car, but also be prepared for the weight of the events that happened here.
