35 Million Years Ago the
Chesapeake Bay Impact Crater (discovered in 1983), hit in the vicinity of
Cape Charles, punching a deep crater in the ocean floor with its outer rim
along today’s present Cape Henry Beach shoreline. At that time the ocean
shoreline extended to Richmond. Millions of tons of water, sediment, and
shattered rock were cast high into the atmosphere for hundreds of miles along
the East Coast. An enormous seismic tsunami engulfed the land and overtopped the
Blue Ridge Mountains, providing the reason sea shells can be found high atop
the Blue Ridge.
18,000-year-old remains of the
first Americans were found at the Cactus Hill Archaeological Site located
60 miles west of Richmond on the Nottoway River in Sussex County. These Asians came
across the Bering Straits, a further migration into the Americas that resumed 20,000
years ago after the Wisconsin Glaciation waned. They settled along the
Susquehanna River (today’s Chesapeake Bay) as the Atlantic Ocean was 130 feet
lower and 50 miles east of the present Virginia shoreline. The Chesapeake
Indians led a peaceful life in a land abounding with huge trees, bountiful
game, and a mild climate. In 1606 thing changed. Chief Powhatan learned
from Algonquin priests that a great danger would arise from the mouth of
the Chesapeake Bay at today’s Cape Henry. Since this was where the Chesapeake
tribe lived, Powhatan’s warriors murdered every man, woman and child. He
apparently slaughtered the wrong group of people.
Who has visited a Virginia Beach site that is
one of two sites relating to the Jamestown settlers? The National Park Service’s Jamestown
Colonial National Historical Park at Cape Henry is on the grounds of the Joint
Expeditionary Base-Fort Story, the spot where the Jamestown Settlers stopped
for four days before sailing on to Jamestown Island.
This story is told at the First
Landing Beach Visitor's Center, one of few places the story is told. It is
presented in pictures, statues, and large flip tablets appropriate for grade
school classes and up. The center is on the beach side entrance to First Landing State Park operated by the Virginia Beach Convention Visitors' Bureau.
The history
of the First Four Days in the New World begins
in the early morning of April 26, 1607 with the landfall at Cape Henry of three
ships, Captain Christopher Newport of the Susan Constant (largest of the
three ships), Captain Gosnold of the Godspeed, and Captain
John Ratcliffe of the Discovery (smallest of three ships). Their
sponsor the Virginia Company of London provided a box containing instructions
to be opened only when the expedition had made landfall.
The orders designated Captain
John Smith (1580 – 1631) to be one of the leaders of the new colony. Since Captain Christopher Newport had charged
Smith with mutiny during the voyage from England, this was indeed a surprising
turn of events for all. But this did
make sense because 27-year old Smith had previously fought in foreign wars as
opposed to the others who had never left London. The Virginia Company orders instructed the
expedition to find a sheltered area up river for protection against Spanish
attack. The next day four carpenters built a 12-man boat (called a shallop)
from wood they brought with them from England, and on April 28 Christopher
Newport set out with a crew to find the best navigable channel for their
journey up the James River, Newport named after King James I (1566 – 1625).
Rowing up the south side of
the James, they found it to be too shallow for their ships which contained huge
mounds of oyster reefs, some just below the surface which would wreck many
ships in the following years. In those days oyster where huge consuming a whole
dinner plate. One is on display at the Ferry Plantation House.
On their return that evening,
they found the northern side of the James to have a channel deep enough for
passage. They described it as "putting them in good comfort"
(today's Old Point Comfort).
On April 29, 1607, the 4th
day before leaving Cape Henry, the expedition set up a wooden cross they
had brought with them from England, and named the land Cape Henry after Henry
Frederick Stuart, Prince of Wales, (1594 – 1612), the elder son of King James I
(1566 – 1625).
Beginning on April 26,
1920 yearly pilgrimages were made to this wooden cross with one of the
celebrations in 1931 attended by more than 10,000 people including President
Hoover.
This wooden cross was replaced
in 1935 with a granite cross, known as the "Cape Henry Cross"
by the National Society Daughters of the American Colonists. In 2014 our
church began participating in the ceremonies by holding a service at the First
Landing Chapel after the blessing of the "Cape Henry Cross."
Pictured here at the 2019
Cape Henry Cross ceremony are Father Bob, our young
Historians, and Historic Traditions Commission members.
There were two
Revolutionary War (April 1775 – Sep1783) battles fought off the shores of Cape
Henry.
On March 16, 1781 after the Battle
of Cape Henry local Lynnhaven Parish residents saw British battle ships
anchored at the mouth of the Lynnhaven River. They had arrived that evening
after being mauled by a French fleet under the command of Admiral Destouches
(de toosh). Destouches had soundly beaten the English fleet but instead Destouches
sailed to Newport RI, a tragic tactical mistake. 
On Sep 1, 1781, Admiral
deGrasse, commander of the French fleet, arrived at the mouth of the
Lynnhaven River in a five day wait for the British. His Statue, a gift from
France, was placed at the Cape Henry Historic Park in 1976. Many of his ships
at anchor were missing officers, men, and boats when the British fleet was
sighted on the morning of Sep 5. Their arrival caught de Grasse
completely off guard. Local Lynnhaven Church members were at the time helping
the French gather supplies. DeGrasse had to leave as many as 200 of his crew
behind when he ordered his fleet to cut anchor at 11:30 a.m. to begin sailing
out of the bay with the noon tide. The French took more than four hours to move
single file through the then Bay's narrow channel. Admiral Graves commander of
the English fleet waited 15 miles from the mouth of the bay, a tragic
tactical mistake.
About 4:00 pm Sep 5,
1781 the French ships cleared the Bay and the historic Battle of the
Capes was under way. The British were the first to open fire, but the
French got the first advantage by aiming at British masts and rigging,
crippling the two led British ships. The 2-1/2-hour epic
battle, perhaps the most significant battle in American history, held the
British fleet from reaching Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown with vital supplies,
thus assuring General Washington of a victory over Cornwallis.
This sea battle became critical in securing America's independence from
England.
The siege of Yorktown began ten days later on Sep 28, 1781 with the British surrendered on Oct 19, 1781.
In 1866 the Virginia
Pilot Association was formed and a 72-foot wooden schooner was anchored off
Cape Henry to serve as the pilot’s base station for maritime traffic entering
the Chesapeake Bay. Pilots waiting at Cape Henry would be transported in a yawl
to the schooner to wait for ships entering the bay. They would then be taken to
an incoming ship in another yawl. The pilot would climb aboard and standing
next to the ship’s captain provide directions though the Chesapeake Bay to
port. The last in a series of schooners, the Virginia III was commissioned
in 1983.
In stormy weather boarding
a ship was not easy as depicted in this 1909 painting.
Pilots waiting to be picked
up at Cape Henry where carried out twenty or so yards piggyback style by an
apprentice pilot to the waiting yawl. In this picture
the apprentice is Johnny Wool’s brother, Ted Wool. Johnny was a long-time member of Old Donation Church's Men’s
Breakfast. He died Nov 5, 2016.
By 1912 Slade,
C. M. Barnett was shipping them to New York’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel and
Grand Central Station. He was responsible for securing $7,000 from a New York
bank for the reconstruction of the church in 1916.
Positioned at
the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, the wilds of the Cape Henry "Desert"
had long been regarded as a "paradise for moonshiners." During prohibition from 1920 to 1933 Cape Henry
played a considerable role in eluding authorities and getting moonshine to the
Middle Atlantic region.
In 1941 the Headquarters
of the Harbor Defense Command was moved from Fort Monroe to Fort Story
requiring more land which extended Fort Story to the ocean consuming the land
where the two lighthouses and O’Keefe’s Restaurant were located. In 1944, Fort Story began to transition from a heavily
fortified coast artillery garrison to a convalescent hospital for returning
veterans. By the time of its closing March 15, 1946, the hospital had
accommodated more than 13,472 patients.
(map of Cape Henry)
