On the Atlantic Ocean and Chesapeake Bay, Virginia Beach borders North Carolina and is the largest city in Virginia.

April 26, 1607 - Adm. Christopher Newport set a landing party ashore at the present site of Virginia Beach. Three days later, his crew erected a cross at the landing site and conducted the first religious ceremony of the Church of England in America.

Fearing the area was too susceptible to attack from natives and the Spanish, Newport chose a small island on the James River to establish the first permanent English colony in the New World, Jamestown.