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PRESTON COUNTY WEST VIRGINIA
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Submitted to the West Virginia Biographies Project by:
Valerie & Tommy Crook
vfcrook@trellis.net
November 26, 1999
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The History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc.,
Chicago and New York, Volume III,
pg. 314
Preston
CHARLES E. TREMBLY. The first settled communities
were planted in Preston County in the closing years of the
eighteenth century. The work of development has been
continuous since then, being participated in by several gen-
erations from the first pioneers. The land has been cleared,
the resources exploited, roads and railroads have been built,
towns have sprung up, and, while not one or the oldest of
these, Terra Alta, situated on the mountain skyline has
been a place of trade and community life for a long period
of years. That it is now one of the progressive and thriv-
ing small cities of the state is due to forces put in motion
by a younger group of citizens within the past two decades.
One of the active leaders, in fact one of the indispensable
men in the newer life of the mountain town, has been
Charles E. Trembly, banker and man of affairs. Mr. Trem-
bly from the first had the outlook of one who is not satis-
fied with half plodding performance, and the spirit of
progress strong within him he has linked with a similar
spirit in others like minded, and together they have ac-
corded a respectful hearing to old tradition without being
bound to its rate of progress, and the sum total of what
they have accomplished comprise the improvements and the
institutions of which Terra Alta is most proud as a pro-
gressive municipality.
Mr. Trembly represents one of the oldest families of
Preston County and was born on a farm near Albright
April 14, 1873. His Americanism is the product of almost
two centuries. About 1730 the first of the Trembly family
came from Scotland and settled on the eastern shore at
Trembly's Point, near Elizabeth, New Jersey. It is said
the house in which he lived is still standing. This Scotch
immigrant was descended from French Protestants who
during the era of religious persecution fled from the Prov-
ince of Rochelle, France. One of the New Jersey family,
Benjamin Trembly, just before the outbreak of the Amer-
ican Revolution, moved on west in company with some of
the McGrew family and settled around Cumberland, Mary-
land. Samuel Darby, a Scotchman from the same New
Jersey colony, accompanied them, but did not arrive in
Preston County until after Trembly, who established his
family at Bruceton Mills, while the Darbys located at Mil-
lers, west of Clifton Mills. Patrick McGrew came on in
1786 and located a mile south of Brandonville. Thus by
previous associations there was a link between these three
prominent families in the wood and mountain region of
Western Virginia.
Benjamin Trembly was born April 13, 1763, at Trembly
Point, and was drowned at Ice's Perry in Cheat River in
1818. His wife, Eunice Pennington, represented a leading
family of New Jersey. Their children were: Josiah, John,
Mary, Sarah, James and Ephraim. The son John was born
March 20, 1786. He married Sarah Darby at Bruceton
Mills, and in 1811 bought the Trembly farm near Albright.
He remained there half a century and died in 1863, while
the Civil war was in progress. His three children were:
Eunice, who became the wife of John Bishop; Samuel and
Benjamin, twin brothers.
Benjamin Trembly, who was born October 16, 1816, mar-
ried Mary Hartman. They lived their lives about Albright,
and their children were George H., Joseph, Sarah, who be-
came the wife of Guy A. Bishop, Michael, John, Samuel
and Adam.
George H. Trembly was born near the little Cheat River
Village of Albright April 7, 1837, and died in 1899. Jan-
uary 9, 1868, he married Eva Charity Smith, who was born
near Albright February 3, 1849, daughter of Jacob Smith.
The children of this marriage are: Frank H., of Jackson-
ville, Florida; Jay S., of Terra Alta; Charles E.; and
Ella M., wife of A. W. Hawley, of Morgantown.
Charles E. Trembly while growing up at Albright had
a great ambition to get a liberal education, and after much
persistence, thrift and earning his own way, he accom-
plished that end. He attended the public schools, at the
age of twenty-one graduated from the Fairmont State
Normal School, subsequently was a student in the Pea-
body Normal College at Nashville, Tennessee, and in 1899
graduated in the scientific course from the University of
West Virginia. The qualifications represented in this lib-
eral education were a splendid preparation for the work
of education which he had chosen, and in 1898-99 he was
assistant principal of the Davis High School, and for three
years was acting principal, until he resigned in 1902 to
become a citizen of Terra Alta and assistant cashier of the
Terra Alta Bank. Mr. Trembly has been a factor in the
success and prosperity of this institution as one of its
managing officials for twenty years, and since November 14,
1910, has been cashier. Throughout this time he has kept
in touch with men similarly minded with regard to what
constitutes the commercial and civic prosperity of the com-
munity. He has been a member of the City Council and
recorder, and the steady influences and efforts emanating
from him and his associates have brought to Terra Alta
such modern facilities as water works, gas light, street
paving and other improvements.
In Preston County August 5, 1915, Mr. Trembly mar-
ried Miss Marjorie Crane, daughter of Dee Crane, who
is potato expert with the University Extension Bureau of
West Virginia. They have a son, Gray Crane. Mr. Trem-
bly is a past master of the Masonic Lodge, is affiliated
with West Virginia Consistory No. 1 of the Scottish Rite
at Wheeling, is a past chancellor of the Knights of Pythias
Lodge, an Odd Fellow, and has served officially as an
elder in the Presbyterian Church.
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