Church Hill Tunnel
The sealed western portal to the Church Hill Tunnel
Overview
LineChesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O)
LocationRichmond, Virginia, U.S.
StatusUnsafe, sealed
Start37°32′10″N 77°25′24″W / 37.5361782110294°N 77.42324092557604°W / 37.5361782110294; -77.42324092557604 (West Portal)
End37°31′38″N 77°24′54″W / 37.52714727530222°N 77.41498622454112°W / 37.52714727530222; -77.41498622454112 (East Portal)
Operation
Opened1873
Closed1925
OwnerCSX Transportation
Technical
Line lengthapproximately 4,000 ft (1,219.2 m)
No. of tracksnone at present
Track gauge4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm)

Church Hill Tunnel is an old Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O) tunnel, built in the early 1870s, which extends approximately 4,000 feet (1,219.2 meters) under the Church Hill district of Richmond, Virginia, United States. On October 2, 1925, the tunnel collapsed on a work train, killing four men and trapping a steam locomotive and ten flat cars. Rescue efforts only resulted in further collapse, and the tunnel was eventually sealed for safety reasons.

Portions of the tunnel have continued to wreak havoc above in the years since, and several houses and a wall of a church have been destroyed by sinkholes near 25th and Broad Streets. More recently, tennis courts and the wall of a house seem to have been victims farther east. Long the subject of community speculation and trespassing incidents at its eastern portal, the tunnel is owned by the C&O's successor entity, CSX Transportation.

The tunnel, which is still considered dangerous, was featured in a 1998 newspaper article by Richmond Times-Dispatch reporter Mark Holmberg and photographer P. Kevin Morley, who explored portions from the eastern portal with professional caving personnel and equipment.[1] Efforts to unseal the tunnel and extract the buried work train have been unsuccessful.

History

Church Hill Tunnel route

Purpose

Church Hill Tunnel was completed in 1873 for the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O),[2][3] which was seeking to extend its trackage (of the former Virginia Central Railroad) from a terminus in the Shockoe Valley section of downtown Richmond to connect with their new Peninsula Subdivision extending approximately 75 miles (120.7 km) southeast down the Virginia Peninsula to reach Collis Potter Huntington's new coal pier in Newport News, Virginia.[4] The tracks to the new tunnel left the old Virginia Central line west of 17th Street and curved southeasterly to enter the tunnel east of N. 18th Street and north of E. Marshall Street under Cedar Street, on the western slope of what is technically Union Hill.[5] The east end of the tunnel appeared just north of Williamsburg Road near 31st Street, below Libby Terrace Park. The Peninsula Subdivision was completed and opened in late 1881, and the coal flowed eastward for export in massive quantities.

Construction problems

The construction of the tunnel was problematic. Unlike the bedrock through which the C&O carved its western tunnels, Richmond's blue marl clay shrink-swell soil tended to change with rainfall and groundwater, causing deadly cave-ins during the construction. The tunnel has remained troublesome throughout its life due to groundwater seepage and safety concerns, even after abandonment in 1925.

Safer alternative

In the 1890s, the C&O acquired the Richmond and Alleghany Railroad (R&A) which had been built east from the Blue Ridge Mountains along the towpath of the James River and Kanawha Canal, proving an alternate "water level" route to Richmond following the north bank of the James River and avoiding a more circuitous route which crossed the North Mountain and Afton Mountain via the Blue Ridge Tunnel and reached Richmond via the former Virginia Central Railroad. However, the R&A terminated at Richmond's Byrd Street Station in the downtown area (7th St. and Canal St.), and did not have a track connection to the C&O which ended at Shockoe Bottom at Broad Street, some distance away. The Virginia State Capitol and its grounds were directly between the two terminals, so creativity for a less direct connection was needed.

To utilize the new "water level" line to ship coal to Newport News, and to avoid the troublesome tunnel as an added benefit, the C&O constructed a three-mile-long double-track elevated viaduct along the riverfront extending between the area of Hollywood Cemetery east past downtown Richmond, the Shockoe Valley, and Church Hill to join the Peninsula Subdivision at what became Fulton Yard east of the tunnel. With a connection just south of the new Main Street Station, it was now possible for traffic to come off the old Virginia Central and enter the Peninsula Subdivision without using the Church Hill Tunnel.

Portions of the viaduct became known as the Rivanna Subdivision Trestle (west of Rivanna Junction) and Peninsula Subdivision Trestle (from the former Brown Street Yard through Main Street Station and Rivanna Junction east to Fulton Yard). The viaduct is believed to be the longest in the United States and is still in use by CSX Transportation, the successor entity to the C&O, which also owns the abandoned tunnel.[5] The viaduct is also the highest level of Richmond's famed Triple Crossing, with railroads at three levels, believed to be the only such place in the world, near where it crosses Richmond's flood wall.

Tunnel disuse, rehabilitation turns tragic

The eastern entrance to the Church Hill Tunnel showing the collapsed roof at top.

After completion of the viaduct in 1901, the Church Hill Tunnel fell into disuse for over twenty years. In 1925, to add capacity, the railroad began efforts to restore it to usable condition.[4] On October 2, while repairs were under way, a work train was trapped by a collapse of 150 feet (45.72 m) of the tunnel near the western end, below Jefferson Park (close to the intersection of N 18th Street and E Marshall).[6] The authorities shut down the streetcar line to the area for several days. At that time there were no homes in the area, as most buildings were around 25th and Broad near Nolde Bros. Bakery[7] where the tunnel crossed the middle of Church Hill.[8]

Approximately 200 workmen crawled under flat cars and then escaped out the eastern end of the tunnel, including the fireman Benjamin F. Mosby (who died hours later at Grace Hospital because of burns caused by the ruptured boiler), but the engineer Thomas Joseph Mason was killed; initial reports claimed that, besides Mason, six black laborers were unaccounted for,[6][9] although the missing number of men was later scaled down to two, identified as day laborers Richard Lewis and “H. Smith.”[10][11] During the next week, the community anxiously watched rescue efforts, but each time progress was made, further cave-ins occurred; only the body of Mason was recovered, on October 10.[11] At that point, only Lewis and Smith were still unaccounted for.[12][13] Their bodies were never found.

The following spring, the Virginia State Corporation Commission (SCC), which regulated the state's railroads, ordered the western end of the tunnel sealed for safety reasons.[10] Left inside was the work train, complete with a 4-4-0 steam locomotive[14] (C&O switch engine no. 231) and ten flat cars.[15]

Vegetation almost hides the tunnel entrance.
The east entrance to the tunnel in 2010.
caption
Looking northwest into the tunnels east entrance in 2010. The floor is under several inches of water. The tunnel is sealed off by a wall some distance in from the entrance, barely visible in this photo.

Later years

The western end is covered with a concrete plug, but for years, the eastern end was used as part of a turning wye for a connection with the Southern Railway's line to West Point and could be entered by venturesome trespassers. Based upon a 1998 exploratory expedition by Richmond Times-Dispatch reporter Mark Holmberg, who explored portions from the eastern end with professional caving personnel and equipment, it is believed that most of the western portion of the tunnel which has not caved in is filled with water.[4] The western entrance can still be seen at the southeast end of an alley off of 18th Street, just north of Marshall. A Virginia historical marker was placed at the site in 2012. The eastern end is hidden in a small, dense jungle just north of the intersection of E. Franklin Street and N. 31st Street. This end of the tunnel is still open for some distance, but its floor and the area outside are swampy.

Recovery discussions

In June 2006, the Virginia Historical Society and other parties announced that they were investigating the possibility of recovering the train and bodies; the Society planned to keep the train for preservation.[16] The History Channel expressed interest in participating in the project. However, when a hole was drilled through the tunnel's seal and a camera was placed inside, the tunnel was discovered to be filled with silt and water, meaning that an excavation of the tunnel would likely cause it to further collapse and cause several homes on Church Hill to be engulfed by massive sinkholes. The project was put on hold.

Urban legend

The Church Hill Tunnel also has been attached to the urban legend of the Richmond Vampire.[17][18][19]

References

  1. ↑ Holmberg, Mark (July 5, 1998). "Crawling Into the Belly of a Richmond Legend". Richmond Times-Dispatch. p. A1. Archived from the original on September 9, 2021. Retrieved September 9, 2021.
  2. ↑ "The Church Hill Tunnel". The Daily State Journal. Alexandria, Virginia. September 17, 1873. p. 1 – via Newspapers.com. Open access icon
  3. ↑ "Completion of Church Hill Tunnel". The Norfolk Virginian. Norfolk, Virginia. October 4, 1873. p. 2 – via Newspapers.com. Open access icon
  4. 1 2 3 "Church Hill Tunnel". VT Underground. Archived from the original on May 30, 2006. Retrieved June 27, 2006.
  5. 1 2 Daily, Larry Z. (1997). "Richmond". C&O Piedmont Subdivision Homepage. Archived from the original on September 10, 2021. Retrieved June 27, 2006.
  6. 1 2 "Richmond planet. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1883-1938, October 10, 1925, Image 1 (page 1 and page 5 pictures of the tunnel's collapsed western portal)". Richmond Planet. October 10, 1925. ISSN 2151-4011. Retrieved September 10, 2021.
  7. ↑ Kappatos, Nicole (September 21, 2017). "From the Archives: Nolde Bros. Bakery in Church Hill". Richmond Times-Dispatch.
  8. ↑ Mensah, Akida; Bushey, Mary Ellen (September 1, 1982). "Transcript of Interview with Mr Aubrey Ramsey, September 1, 1982". Virginia Black History Archives, Church Hill Oral History Collection. Virginia Commonwealth University Libraries. Archived from the original on October 12, 1999. Retrieved June 27, 2006.
  9. ↑ "Tunnel Caves In--Seven Missing". Bismarck Tribune. October 3, 1925. Retrieved June 24, 2019.
  10. 1 2 "The Train in the Tunnel". Richmond Public Library: Newspaper Clipping Files; Literature and History Department; Main Library. Archived from the original on February 20, 2006. Retrieved June 27, 2006.
  11. 1 2 Swenson, Ben (April 22, 2013). "The Church Hill Tunnel; Two Portals a World Apart". Abandoned Country.
  12. ↑ Pitman, Ronnie. "Church Hill Tunnel". Flickr. Retrieved June 24, 2019.
  13. ↑ "Church Hill Tunnel, Richmond, VA, USA". Frederic Delaitre Railway Pages. November 21, 2016. Archived from the original on August 17, 2016. Retrieved May 22, 2018.
  14. ↑ "Surviving Steam Locomotives in Virginia". SteamLocomotive.com: Surviving Steam Locomotives. June 21, 2006. Archived from the original on December 8, 2004. Retrieved June 27, 2006.
  15. ↑ Mark, Holmberg (August 9, 2006). "A peek at a buried train, via scientific tunnel vision". www.ble-t.org. Archived from the original on August 17, 2021. Retrieved September 10, 2021.
  16. ↑ "Virginia Town Targets Mystery Train's Secrets". National Public Radio. June 28, 2006. Retrieved January 13, 2021.
  17. ↑ Holmberg, Mark (October 31, 2013). "HOLMBERG: How a vampire came to haunt a Richmond cemetery". CBS 6 News Richmond WTVR. Archived from the original on May 23, 2022. Retrieved May 1, 2023.
  18. ↑ Mahnke, Aaron (May 2, 2016). "Episode 33: A Dead End". Lore. Archived from the original on August 22, 2021. Retrieved May 1, 2023.
  19. ↑ "VGHRS". September 29, 2001. Archived from the original on September 29, 2001. Retrieved May 1, 2023.
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