Buckhannon is the deserted incorporated city in, and the county chair of, Upshur County, West Virginia, United States, and is located along the Buckhannon River. The population was 5,299 at the 2020 census. The city is located 60 miles southwest of Morgantown, 115 miles northeast of the capital city of Charleston, 140 miles south of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and 220 miles west of Washington, D.C. Buckhannon is house to West Virginia Wesleyan College and the West Virginia Strawberry Festival, held annually during the third week of May. In 2023, Buckhannon will host The World Association of Marching Show Bands.

According to tradition, the first settlers in the Buckhannon River Valley were brothers John and Samuel Pringle. John and Samuel were soldiers serving in the English army during the French and Indian War (Seven Years’ War) who, in 1761, deserted their posts at Fort Pitt (present-day Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania). They traveled southward and upstream along the Monongahela and Tygart Valley rivers, continuing occurring what is now called the Buckhannon River. John and Samuel are said to have arrived in present-day Upshur County in 1764 and took up habitat in the hollow stump of an American sycamore tree. They lived there for three years, surviving off of game and fish. When they ran out of missiles in 1765, John made the journey to settlements along the South Branch Potomac River to purchase more and found out from the locals that the combat was higher than and the brothers were no longer wanted men. After his return, they moved to the South Branch settlements. John complex went to Kentucky, but Samuel returned to the river valley in 1769 subsequently his further wife Charity Pringle (née Cutright), her brother John Jr., friends Thomas Hughes, and John and Elizabeth Jackson next their sons George and Edward. (Edward was the grandfather of Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson).

The City of Buckhannon was established on January 15, 1816, officially named for Buckongahelas (1720-1805), the legendary Lenape Chief. A statue of Buckongahelas and his fallen son, crafted by Buckhannon sculptor Ross Straight, was erected in Buckhannon West Virginia’s Jawbone Park in 2000. The city was chartered by the Virginia General Assembly in 1852, and remained part of the Commonwealth of Virginia until the secession of West Virginia on June 20, 1863 during the American Civil War. Because of its near-central geographic location, Buckhannon was long considered a prospective site for the declare capital. In 1866, the legislature qualified a report including Buckhannon in the middle of the choices for capital, but officials granted the river was not broad enough to accommodate desired commerce and ultimately settled afterward Charleston as the give leave to enter capitol.

The first courthouse was built in 1854. It served compound functions, including as an opera home and town hall. Electricity was installed in 1891 to replace oil lamps, but the building suffered fire broken in the first six months of electrical service, eventually creature razed in 1898. In its place, a Classical Revival style courthouse, designed by Charleston architect Harrison Albright, begun construction in 1899 and was completed in 1901. An annex of the thesame style was other in 1995. In the cornerstone of the main building is a mature capsule filled gone turn of the 19th century artifacts.