present national government, the foundation-stone of constitutional liberty for the English speaking race was laid firmly and irremovably at Jamestown. The House of Burgesses convened there from 1619 to 1698. In 1698 the seat of government was moved from Jamestown to Middle Plantation (Williamsburg) which lies half in James City and half in York County. Many of us in the peninsular counties had forebears who sat in this august assemblage. Representing Kecoughtan at this first Legislative Assembly held in the New World at Jamestown in 1619, were William Tucker, and William Capps. These gentlemen were commissioned to ask the House of Burgesses for a change of name for Kecoughtan. Says an old chronicle concerning that event: “Some people, in pious frame of mind, took a spite at Kecoughtan name and said a name so heathen should not be for a people so pious as we, and suggesting some other names, they made their grudges to old King James, and so the King a new name found, for this fine section and all around.”
The name Kecoughtan does not appear regularly in legal documents from 1619. The new name, Elizabeth City, was called after the daughter of King James I. The corporation of Elizabeth City developed into Elizabeth City County in 1634. In 1705 the town of Hampton was founded by an act of the Legislature. The name was in honor of the English Earl of Southampton.
The American Revolution, the War of 1812, and the War Between the States left their impress on old Hampton. In 1812 and again in 1861, the “Gamecock Town” was burned. Attesting their loyalty to and love for the cause of the Confederacy, the inhabitants, in August, 1861, set fire to their own homes rather than have them fall into the hands of the Federal troops who were approaching. General Macgruder commanded the Confederates.
“Furl that Banner! True, ’tis gory,
Yet ’tis wreathed around with glory,
And ’twill live in song and story,
Though its folds are in the dust.”
The loyalty of Hampton to the Union has been tried and proved in the Spanish-American, and World Wars. Side by side the descendants of the followers of Lee and
