What's in a Name? | Kempsville

VIRGINIA BEACH

Three centuries ago, long before Kempsville was home to sprawling Virginia Beach suburbs, it was a small river port and the scene of two somewhat obscure incidents in the war for American independence.

In the mid-1600s, George Kempe, an industrious English immigrant, acquired land along the Eastern Branch of the Elizabeth River. He developed a port for the shipment of tobacco and other goods.

By 1700, the area grew into a small community known as Kempe’s Landing – also spelled Kemp’s Landing – where tobacco warehouses lined the shore, according to history books.

Not long after the Revolutionary War began in 1775, Virginia’s royal governor, Lord Dunmore, led about 140 British troops to Kempe’s Landing apparently in search of firearms and gunpowder.

Historian Ivor Noël Hume in his 1966 book “1775 – Another Part of the Field,” wrote that Dunmore met little resistance when entering the village in October of that year. The leaders of the local militia, some known as Shirtmen because they favored buckskin hunting shirts, were alerted to the approaching royal troops but after talking it over decided not to fight.

Hume wrote that one account from that time said the leader of the Princess Anne County minutemen, Col. Joseph Hutchings, had imbibed too much alcohol and was so intoxicated he fell to the ground as the militia dispersed. Hutchings avoided capture when a passing butcher herding his cattle nearby “covered him with trash.”

Six other Americans were taken prisoner. The British also found and destroyed 50 muskets in a blacksmith shop.

A month later on Nov. 14, Dunmore and his forces returned to the village after hearing rebels were assembling. As the Redcoats approached, the Americans, waiting in dense forest, fired at the troops. But their musket rounds fell short.

In response, Dunmore’s troops broke ranks and rushed the Americans.

“This is not the way the militia had expected the game to be played, and they promptly ran for their lives,” Hume wrote.

In all, five Americans were killed, including two who drowned while attempting to cross a creek.

Other accounts note that the first to be killed was John Ackiss – giving him the distinction of being the first Virginian killed in the Revolutionary War. The engagement was later dubbed the “Skirmish of Kempsville.”

The Americans fared much better a month later and a several miles away during the better-known Battle of Great Bridge, where scores of British were killed as they attempted to attack American positions.

The Dec. 9, 1775, battle fought near today’s Great Bridge Bridge on Battlefield Boulevard in Chesapeake is considered a crucial early victory in the war.

Meanwhile, Kempe’s Landing’s prominence grew even with a war going on. The courthouse for Princess Anne County was moved to the village in 1778 and remained there until 1824, when it was moved to a more central location. Today, the location contains the Virginia Beach Municipal Center.

Over time, the name Kempe’s Landing was set aside, and the settlement was incorporated as the town of Kempsville in 1783. The town disappeared in 1963 when Virginia Beach, then a small coastal city, merged with Princess Anne County and created today’s city boundaries. Kempsville remains one of seven City Council districts.

Bill Bartel, (757) 446-2398, bill.bartel@pilotonline.com