24/7 Trauma & Biohazard Cleanup Near North Inez Inez, KY

Inez is a home rule-class city and the county seat of Martin County, Kentucky, in the state's eastern coalfields, and its name is pronounced EYE-nez.

James Ward first settled the Inez area about 1810, when the community was known as Arminta Ward's Bottom.

J.M. Stepp renamed the community Eden about the time it became the seat of Martin County government in 1873, after the seat was moved from Warfield to a more central location.

Because another Kentucky post office was already named Eden, the town was renamed Inez on June 23, 1874, a name usually held to honor Inez Frank, daughter of the postmaster in Louisa, in neighboring Lawrence County.

Martin County itself was formed in 1870 and named for Congressman John Preston Martin.

Inez was not formally incorporated until February 5, 1942.

In 1964 President Lyndon B. Johnson visited Inez, arriving by helicopter, to promote his War on Poverty, at a time when the local poverty rate was more than 60 percent.

In 1889 two West Virginia fugitives from the Lincoln County Feud, Milt Haley and Green McCoy, were captured and held in the Martin County jail in Inez before a West Virginia posse seized and lynched them.

Inez covers about 1.72 square miles.

The 2020 census counted 546 residents in Inez, down sharply from 717 in 2010, while the 2000 census counted 466 people in 212 households.