Land, Legacy, and Love: A New Home after Hurricane Helene

About 15 minutes from exit 19 sits Barnardsville in the quiet valleys of northern Buncombe County. The Barnardsville community has long been a place of beauty and resilience. Homes dot the creek that winds through the hollers, connecting farmland and families. But devastation became the new reality for nearly every street in the community when Hurricane Helene’s torrential rains turned that gentle creek into a raging river.

Four months later, the scars of the storm remain as stark as ever. Mangled cars and metal bridges lie tangled among uprooted trees. Entire homes, once vibrant with life, sit collapsed or thrown off their foundations. The once-rich Appalachian soil is now strewn with the wreckage of lives uprooted—splintered wood, shards of plastic, and giant boulders.

In the heart of this devastation, amidst the trailers now dotting the lots where homes once stood, live Charles and Sadey English. Married for 52 years, the couple are emblematic of the Appalachian spirit—steadfast, proud, god-fearing, and deeply rooted. They lost their home that September morning when floodwaters swallowed everything they’d built.

“It’s hard when you work hard all your life to have something and you see every bit taken away from you,” Charles shared, his voice heavy with pain. “It just tore my heart out of me, standing up there on the bank, watching it all disappear.”Charles stayed as long as he could that night, trying to protect what little he could, but when the water started to rise into the house, he fled to the only safe place, up the mountain from his home. Two hours passed before he was able to walk down the mountain. “The mud was so thick, I could hardly pull my feet out,” he said. “It took me three hours to walk just a mile out. I was bout to give out by the time I got out of there.”

When he reached safety, he was covered in mud to his waist, utterly exhausted but alive.

Sabra English with her father Charles English

Sadey had left earlier with their grandchildren, but her heart was never far from their land. “We own the land here,” she said. “We can’t afford to buy land nowhere else, so we just make the best of it.” This land isn’t just property—it’s history. Passed down through Sadey’s family for generations, it holds memories of their children’s first steps, countless harvests from their garden, and jars of canned green beans that symbolize a lifetime of hard work.

Their daughter, Sabra, was raised in the house destroyed by the flood. She described the panic of that night, searching for her father in the dark.

“I come in after the waters had gone down, wading through mud. The pavement gave out beneath us, and we had to run to the cow pastures to get through. We get here, and I just take off running, like I don’t see anything, it's dark, and we have flashlights and we went all the way up in the house and looking everywhere. Finally, I get to my uncle, who said, ‘I seen your dad get out, he’s okay.’ I just hit my knees.”

When she found Charles hours later, sitting at a kitchen table, his clothes soaked and muddy, she collapsed in relief. “I just thanked God and held him for ten minutes.”

Now, their home is gone. “There’s a camper where our house used to be,” Sabra said. Yet even in their temporary trailer, with its layers of insulation struggling to fend off the winter cold, Charles and Sadey exude warmth. They greeted the United Way of Asheville and Buncombe County team like old friends, their camper filled with hugs, stories, and the determination to rebuild.

Their determination was echoed in Sabra recounting her mother’s first action after the flood waters receded, “My mom waded through to get her canned green beans that we worked so hard on. That says a lot to Appalachian people to wade through septic and get what you worked on, because she had a garden every year.”

Thanks to the generosity of a United Way donor and the strength of community connections, the English family will soon have a new home, and their garden will be raised on the spot where their camper sits now. A double-wide home will be placed on the land that has been theirs for generations—a testament to what’s possible when neighbors come together.

Charles English looks at where his home was

The donor, who recently had a mobile home become available, knew there were families in need and turned to United Way of Asheville and Buncombe County because of our deep connections in the community.

Aisha and Jen, from our community engagement team, spent the early days of the crisis working alongside local organizations and listening to people across Buncombe County. They reached out to partners at Big Ivy who, with input from their own community, quickly identified the English family.

“This is something I hope nobody else ever has to experience,” Charles said. But he also expressed gratitude—for the people who have helped his family take the first steps toward rebuilding and for a community that looks out for one another.

The English family’s story is just one of hundreds across Western North Carolina—a vivid reminder of Hurricane Helene's devastation. But it’s also a story of resilience, generosity, and the power of connection. Every act of support—whether through time, resources, or financial giving—creates a pathway for families like the Englishes to rebuild their homes and futures.

To all those who have stepped up in this recovery, you are part of this story. You are part of the reason Charles and Sadey have hope for the future—standing together on the land they love, ready to start anew.

United Way of Asheville and Buncombe County will continue to follow Sadey and Charles English’s journey as they work towards rebuilding their lives.

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