McDowell County Courthouse / Sid Hatfield

After Welch was named the county seat in 1892, Frank Pierce Milburn designed the McDowell County Courthouse, which was constructed in 1893-94, enlarged in 1909, and added to the National Register in 1979. On August 1, 1921, former Matewan Chief of Police Sid Hatfield and Ed Chambers were murdered on the courthouse steps by Baldwin-Felts agents; three men were charged in the murders but were acquitted. Born in Kentucky, Hatfield had worked as a blacksmith and coal miner before becoming chief of police in Matewan, Mingo County. Sympathetic to unionization there, he joined striking miners on May 19, 1920, in the shootout known as the Matewan Massacre with Baldwin-Felts agents. His murder in 1921 led to the Miners’ March on Logan and the Battle of Blair Mountain.

Welch, West Virginia · United States