Norfolk: The First Four Centuries

by Thomas C. Parramore

The first comprehensive history of Norfolk to appear since 1930, Norfolk: The First Four Centuries tells the story of America's largest maritime port from the first contact between a Spanish sailor and a Chiskiack man in 1561 to the city's late twentieth-century concerns, including pollution of the Chesapeake Bay, urban development, traffic in illegal guns, and racial tensions.

Genres: History

512 pages, Paperback

First published October 22, 1994

Reviews

[Paula · Rating 3 out of 5]

Highlighted sections, noted by Beth:
p29 'The Thorowgoods were a respectable family of Grimston, County Norfolk, England, where Adam's father had for many years been a rector." Adam, age 18, went to Virginia as indentured servant in 1621 to learn business of growing tobacco. 5 years at Kecoughtan on Chesapeake Bay. By 1627 when he visited England, had acquired his own modest holdings.
p31 "The Thorowgoods were among the first colonists--if not the first--to settle on bay's south shore." Others--Thomas Willoughby and Francis Mason...Most leading families had been neighbors at 'Bass's Choice' on James River (Willoughby, Mason, John Sibsey, Daniel Tanner) and all took up land on or near Elizabeth River.
p34 "...Puritanism gained full sway over England by the late 1640s, but Virginia's leaders, royalist and Anglican to the core, still battled against it."
p79 (not noted by Beth, but the Freeman name caught my eye) Dr. Thomas Burke, an Irishman, moved in 1769 from the eastern shore to Norfolk, practiced law; and in 1770 married Norfolk County's Mary 'Polly' Freeman.

[Larry]

Moved - no longer have the book.