Colonial County of Isle of Wight, Colony of Virginia, British Colonial America (North America)

The Isle of Wight County is located in the Hampton Roads region of Virginia, USA with a northeastern boundary on the coast of Hampton Roads waterway "Hampton Roads" is the name of both a body of water that today serves as a wide channel for the James, Nansemond and Elizabeth rivers between Old Point Comfort and Sewell's Point (where the Chesapeake Bay flows into the Atlantic Ocean) and the surrounding metropolitan region located in the Southeastern Virginia and Northeastern North Carolina portions of the Tidewater region The original name for this area was "Warrosquyoake Shire", derived from the name of the Native Americans of the area; shortly after the establishment of the Jamestown Colony (see Colony of Virginia note), the settlers began to spread out into the areas adjacent to the waterway creating the county. The name went through transliteration and Anglicisation, eventually becoming known as "Warwicke Squeake" County… it was renamed in 1637 to the "Isle of Wight County" after the island off of the south coast of England, from where many of its early colonists had come A Captain John Smith crossed the James River in 1608 and obtained fourteen bushels of corn from the Native American inhabitants, the Warrosquyoack (or Warraskoyak), a tribe of the Powhatan Confederacy, who had three towns in the area of modern Smithfield. English colonists drove the Warraskoyak from their villages in 1622 and 1627, as part of their reprisals for the Great Massacre of 1622, in which the Native Americans had decimated English settlements, hoping to drive them out of their territory As the county population developed, the leaders thought that they needed a county seat near the center of the area and built a new courthouse near the center of the county in 1800 as its county seat named "Isle of Wight"… the courthouse & associated tavern (Boykin's Tavern) are still standing, as are the 1822 clerk's offices nearby. A new courthouse was opened in 2010, across the street from the sheriff's office and county offices complex. The original courthouse serves as the government chambers for the Board of Supervisors, as well as the meeting hall for the School Board; the chambers are sometimes used as a court for civil trials if the new courthouse is fully in use The county features two incorporated towns, Smithfield and Windsor. The first courthouse for the county was built in Smithfield in 1750; the original courthouse and its associated tavern (The Smithfield Inn) are still standing (as of 2019) As of the 2010 census, the population was 35,270