Captain John Heth was a Virginian naval officer and businessman in the coal mining industry.

Black Heath was a house and coal mine located near the present day Midlothian area of Chesterfield County, Virginia. The Black Heath coal mining enterprises were operated intermittently from the early 1780s until 1939 and were most notably run by the Heth family from 1795 until 1840, who also built the mansion house in the early 1800s. During the early tenure of the Heths' operation, the Black Heath mines were one of the largest producers of coal in the United States and supplied coal to the White House during US President Thomas Jefferson's term. In 1840, control shifted to an English group of investors who oversaw the mines at a distance until 1888, when they were sold to another interest which soon went into trusteeship. During the 1910s or 1920s, the Black Heath house collapsed due to severe undermining from the numerous coal shafts and tunnels scattered around the property. In 1938, the Black Heath land was sold to coal mining interests who soon went into trusteeship and default like many others before them. Over the next few decades, the land sat idle until 1971, when it began to be parceled off into housing developments.