Richmond, Virginia

After King James I granted a charter to the Virginia Company in London in 1607, Jamestown was founded. Just eight days later, two of the English ship captains, John Smith and Christopher Newport, explored up the James River to the present site. Later, over one hundred men would form an expedition and settle at the Falls of the James, now located in downtown Richmond.

Four years later in 1611, the Governor of Jamestown organized settlement of Henricus, just down river from the Falls of the James. This settlement housed the first hospital in America. Pocahontas resided in Henricus.

In 1622, every settlement in Virginia except for Jamestown had been destroyed by the Powhatan during the Powhatan Uprising. Because of this in 1624, King James I took back the charter from the Virginia Company in London, and Virginia became a colony of Britain. The Native Americans gave all territory down river from the Falls of the James to the English in a treaty in 1646.

Nathaniel Bacon led Bacons Rebellion against Native Americans in the region in 1676. In 1698, Jamestown was no longer the capital of Virginia. It had moved to Williamsburg.

By the 1700s, the population of the Richmond area was still less than two hundred. A tobacco inspector station was set up at the Falls of the James in 1730. In 1737, the first street plan for the town of Richmond was developed. Five years later, Richmond was chartered as a town.. Patrick Henry gave his Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death speech at St. Johns Church at the Second Virginia Convention in Richmond. In 1780, Richmond became the capital of Virginia. In 1781, the city was burned by order of Benedict Arnold. It was incorporated as a city in 1782. The state capitol, designed by Thomas Jefferson, started being built in 1785.

By the 1800s, the population of Richmond had increased to almost six thousand. The first stagecoach lines to the city were created during the War of 1812. In 1848, Henry Brown escaped slavery by nailing himself inside of a small box and shipped to Philadelphia from Richmond.

In 1861, partly because of the citys huge capacity for manufacturing, it was chosen as the Confederacys capital. In June of 1862, the Seven Days Battle was fought. In late 1865, Confederate soldiers retreating from the advancing Union army burned down much of the former Confederate capital. The first segregated schools in Richmond were created in 1869. In 1870, one of the worst floods in over one hundred years destroyed much of Richmond, and the third floor of the State Capitol collapsed. The first electric street car system in the United States opened in 1888 in Richmond.

By 1900, the population of Richmond had ballooned to over 85,000. In 1914, the city became the headquarters of the fifth district of the Federal Reserve Bank. In 1922, Virginia women were granted the right to vote. The Defense General Supply Center, nine miles to the South of Richmond, was a major supply hub during World War II. By 1946, Richmond was the quickest growing industrial center in America. Hurricane Agnes dumped so much rain on Richmond in 1972 that the James River rose to over six feet above the previous record. In 1990, the first African American governor in American history was elected. In 1995, a floodwall was completed, which now keeps the James River from damaging the city.

Richmond, Virginia, has one of the longest and most colorful histories in the United States. Few other cities in America can boast that they have once been the capital of a country, even if it was only for four years.

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