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Founding
Founding of Portsmouth
independent city in Virginia, United States
- 1752
- North America
Founding
independent city in Virginia, United States
Fetching the article from Wikipedia…
Portsmouth ( PORTS-məth) is an independent city in southeastern Virginia, United States. It lies across the Elizabeth River from Norfolk. As of the 2020 census, the population was 97,915. It is the ninth-most populous city in Virginia and is part of the Hampton Roads metropolitan area. Due to its strategic location, the city has long been associated with the United States Armed Forces, particularly the Navy. The Norfolk Naval Shipyard is a historic and active Navy facility located in Portsmouth.
In 1620, the future site of Portsmouth was recognized as a suitable shipbuilding location by John Wood, a shipbuilder, who petitioned King James I of England for a land grant. The surrounding area was soon settled as a plantation community.
Portsmouth was founded by Colonel William Crawford, a member of the Virginia House of Burgesses. It was established as a town in 1752 by an act of the Virginia General Assembly and was named for Portsmouth, England.
In 1767, Andrew Sprowle, a shipbuilder, founded the Gosport Shipyard adjacent to Portsmouth. The Gosport Shipyard at Portsmouth was owned by the Commonwealth of Virginia after the American Revolutionary War and was sold to the new United States federal government. In 1779, Portsmouth was sacked by British forces during the Revolutionary War.
Following the Revolutionary War, James Monroe invited Marquis de Lafayette to visit the United States. Lafayette accepted, and was celebrated with parades and balls all around the country. In October 1824, Lafayette visited the town, stopping to have tea at Hill House. In 1836, the town of Portsmouth was incorporated.
In 1855, the Portsmouth and Norfolk area suffered an epidemic of yellow fever which killed 1 of every three citizens. On June 6, 1855, the Benjamin Franklin vessel arrived in Hampton Roads for repairs. The ship had just sailed from the West Indies, where there had been an outbreak of yellow fever. The port health officer ordered the ship quarantined. After twelve days, a second inspection found no issues, so it was allowed to dock at the Gosport Shipyard in Portsmouth. Workers from the shipyard began to fall ill, and it was later discovered that the ship's captain had concealed sailors who were suffering from the disease. Some of the workers from the shipyard lived in Norfolk, and returned home by taking the ferry across the Elizabeth River, taking the yellow fever with them. The poor and immigrants were the first to fall ill. At the time, no one understood how the disease was transmitted, though it was later determined to have spread via mosquitoes and poor sanitation. This lack of understanding led to widespread panic, and about one-third of Portsmouth's 10,000 residents fled the region in the hopes of escaping the epidemic. New York banned all persons and vessels from the region, since both Norfolk and Portsmouth were infected. Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Richmond, Petersburg, and Suffolk also banned persons from the region. Mathews County and the Eastern Shore remained open to those fleeing the illness. The Gosport Navy Yard remained open, but more than 1,000 shipyard workers left. By the end of August, only 3,000 residents remained in Portsmouth. The number of infected reached 5,000 in September, and by the second week of September, a combined 1,500 had died in Norfolk and Portsmouth. As fall arrived and the weather cooled, the outbreak began to wane, leaving a final tally of about 3,200 dead in the region.
The Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church was built in 1857. During the 19th century, the church was part of the Underground Railroad. Freedom seekers from Virginia and other slave states used the church as a hiding place and refuge on their way to the abolitionist Northern United States. Individuals would hide in the basement, attic, and behind the organ until moving on to the next location.
In 1858, Portsmouth became an independent city, but it remained the seat of Norfolk County.
During the American Civil War, in 1861, Virginia joined the Confederate States of America. Fearing that the Confederacy would take control of the shipyard at Portsmouth, the shipyard commander ordered the burning of the shipyard. The Confederate forces did in fact take over the shipyard and did so without armed conflict through an elaborate ruse orchestrated by civilian railroad builder William Mahone (soon to become a famous Confederate officer). The Union forces withdrew to Fort Monroe across Hampton Roads, which was the only land in the area which remained under Union control.
In early 1862, the Confederate ironclad warship CSS Virginia was rebuilt using the burned-out hulk of USS Merrimack. Virginia engaged the Union ironclad USS Monitor in the famous Battle of Hampton Roads during the Union blockade of Hampton Roads. The Confederates burned the shipyard again when they left in May 1862.
Following the recapture of Norfolk and Portsmouth by the Union forces, the name of the shipyard was changed to Norfolk Naval Shipyard. The name of the shipyard was derived from its location in Norfolk County. The Norfolk Naval Shipyard today is located entirely within the city limits of Portsmouth, Virginia. The Norfolk Naval Shipyard name has been retained to minimize any confusion with the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, which itself is actually located in Kittery, Maine, across the Piscataqua River from Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
By 1870, the population of the city was 10,590.
In 1894, the city annexed portions of Norfolk County North of the city.
In 1909, the city annexed additional areas west of the city that were previously part of Norfolk County. By 1910, due to the annexation and the city's growth, the population had increased to 33,190.
The Key Road School, the first school for Black children in the area, was founded in 1921 by Julius Rosenwald and Booker T. Washington. The school was open to students from first through seventh grade. In 1926, the school moved to a new building, with funding coming from the Black community, the Rosenwald Fund, and Norfolk County. The school closed in 1965. After the school ceased operations, the I.C. Norcom School Boosters briefly used the building as its headquarters. In 1971, the Olympian Sports Club, which sponsors Black youth athletics, began using the building. In 2017, the city sought to condemn and raze the former school building, but the African-American Historic Society of Portsmouth fought for the building to receive historic designation, and the building was preserved. It is marked with a Virginia Historical Highway Marker.
During and after World War II, the shipyard flourished, and suburban development surrounded both Norfolk and Portsmouth. The Portsmouth Naval Shipyard Museum was established in 1949. In 1948, Portsmouth annexed additional areas from the county, expanding the city boundary westward to the Western Branch area. In 1960, Portsmouth annexed an additional ten square miles of Norfolk County, increasing the population by 36,000 residents. The total population in 1960 was 114,773. Portsmouth continued as the county seat of Norfolk County until 1963 when the new city of Chesapeake was formed in a political consolidation with the city of South Norfolk. In 1968, Portsmouth again annexed parts of Norfolk County, including ten square miles of land, 14 square miles of water area, and 11,000 residents. The newly annexed parts were all within the northern third of the Western Branch Borough. Portsmouth's other county neighbor, the former Nansemond County, also consolidated with a smaller city, forming the new city of Suffolk in 1974.
During the 1998 Hurricane Bonnie, the Naval Shipyard provided safe haven for vessels of the Atlantic Fleet that were unable to get underway.
By 2000, the population of Portsmouth was 100,565. As one of the older cities of Hampton Roads, in the early 21st century, Portsmouth was undergoing moderate urban renewal in the downtown.
The APM "MAERSK" marine terminal for container ships opened in 2007 in the West Norfolk section.
By 2010, the population had decreased to 95,535. By 2020, the population had increased slightly for the first time in decades, with 97,915 residents.
Text from the Wikipedia article “Portsmouth, Virginia”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.