Charles Hardaway Marks Bridges are twin spans which carry State Route 10 across the

Appomattox River The Appomattox River is a tributary of the James River, approximately long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed April 1, 2011 in central and eastern Virginia in the United ...

in Virginia. The bridges are in Chesterfield County,

Prince George County Prince George County is a county (United States), county located in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 43,010. Its county seat is Prince George, Virginia ...

, and the independent city of Hopewell in the

Tri-Cities Tri-Cities most often refers to: *Tri-Cities, Tennessee, United States *Tri-Cities, Washington, United States Tri-City, Tricity or Tri-Cities may also refer to: Populated places Americas Canada *Tri-Cities (British Columbia), consisting of Co ...

area of the Richmond-Petersburg region. The first span was completed in the early 1970s and the second span was constructed in the mid-1990s. In 1998, the bridges were named in honor of

Charles Hardaway Marks Charles Hardaway Marks (January 31, 1921 – November 13, 2004) was an American attorney and politician. Political career Marks, a Democrat served as a member of the Virginia House of Delegates from 1962 to 1991 where he represented the people o ...

(1921–2004), a prominent local attorney and politician who was long a state legislator representing the area in the Virginia General Assembly. Marks was a retired US Marine Corps Captain who served in the

Pacific theater The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...

during World War II, was wounded at the

Battle of Iwo Jima The Battle of Iwo Jima (19 February – 26 March 1945) was a major battle in which the United States Marine Corps (USMC) and United States Navy (USN) landed on and eventually captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Imperial Japanese Army (IJ ...

and awarded a Purple Heart. He served in the Virginia House of Delegates from 1962 through 1991. Due to the wording of the Hopewell city charter, the portion of the

adjacent to the shoreline of that city is in Prince George County. Thus, a portion of the twin bridges pass through the county as they cross the river. Nearby the current bridges was an earlier

drawbridge A drawbridge or draw-bridge is a type of moveable bridge typically at the entrance to a castle or tower surrounded by a moat. In some forms of English, including American English, the word ''drawbridge'' commonly refers to all types of moveable ...

which was the site of a fatal

bus A bus (contracted from omnibus, with variants multibus, motorbus, autobus, etc.) is a road vehicle that carries significantly more passengers than an average car or van. It is most commonly used in public transport, but is also in use for cha ...

accident on December 22, 1935, which killed 13 people who drowned when the bus failed to stop and plunged into the river while the drawbridge was open.Daily News-1935
/ref>

References

Charles Hardaway Marks Bridges Charles Hardaway Marks Bridges are twin spans which carry State Route 10 (Virginia), State Route 10 across the Appomattox River in Virginia. The bridges are in Chesterfield County, Virginia, Chesterfield County, Prince George County, Virginia, Pr ...

Marks Transportation in Prince George County, Virginia Buildings and structures in Chesterfield County, Virginia Road bridges in Virginia {{Virginia-bridge-struct-stub