Skiffe's Creek is located in

James City County James City County is a county located in the Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 78,254. Although politically separate from the county, the county seat is the adjacent independent city of Williamsburg. Located ...

and the independent city of Newport News in the Virginia Peninsula area of the

Hampton Roads Hampton Roads is the name of both a body of water in the United States that serves as a wide channel for the James River, James, Nansemond River, Nansemond and Elizabeth River (Virginia), Elizabeth rivers between Old Point Comfort and Sewell's ...

region of southeastern Virginia in the United States. It is a tributary of the

James River The James River is a river in the U.S. state of Virginia that begins in the Appalachian Mountains and flows U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map , accessed April 1, 2011 to Chesapea ...

Early history 17th-19th centuries

In the early 17th century, Skiffe's Creek bordered Martin's Hundred, a proprietary settlement dating to 1618 in the British

Colony of Virginia The Colony of Virginia, chartered in 1606 and settled in 1607, was the first enduring English colonial empire, English colony in North America, following failed attempts at settlement on Newfoundland (island), Newfoundland by Sir Humphrey GilbertG ...

. The creek formed one of the borders between James City Shire and Warwick Shire when they were formed in 1634 by the House of Burgesses as directed by King Charles I as two of the eight original shires of Virginia. For over 300 years it was part of the boundary between James City County and Warwick County. The latter consolidated into the city of Newport News in 1958. The creek continues to be the dividing line between the two political subdivisions of Virginia. In 1881, Skiffe's Creek was bridged by a trestle of the new Peninsula Subdivision as the

Collis P. Huntington Collis Potter Huntington (October 22, 1821 – August 13, 1900) was an American industrialist and railway magnate. He was one of the Big Four of western railroading (along with Leland Stanford, Mark Hopkins, and Charles Crocker) who invested ...

led the development of the

Chesapeake and Ohio Railway The Chesapeake and Ohio Railway was a Class I railroad formed in 1869 in Virginia from several smaller Virginia railroads begun in the 19th century. Led by industrialist Collis P. Huntington, it reached from Virginia's capital city of Richmond t ...

through the new Church Hill Tunnel and down the Virginia Peninsula through

Williamsburg Williamsburg may refer to: Places *Colonial Williamsburg, a living-history museum and private foundation in Virginia *Williamsburg, Brooklyn, neighborhood in New York City *Williamsburg, former name of Kernville (former town), California *Williams ...

to reach

coal pier A coal pier is a transloading facility designed for the transfer of coal between rail and ship. The typical facility for loading ships consists of a holding area and a system of conveyors for transferring the coal to dockside and loading it into t ...

s located on the harbor

, the East Coast of the United States' largest ice-free port. During the ten years from 1878 to 1888, C&O's coal resources began to be developed and shipped eastward. Coal became a staple of the C&O's business at that time, and still did over 125 years later under successor

CSX Transportation CSX Transportation , known colloquially as simply CSX, is a Class I freight railroad operating in the Eastern United States and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. The railroad operates approximately 21,000 route miles () of track. ...

. About 2 miles east of the Skiffe's Creek crossing, the Lee Hall depot was built in 1881-82, and later expanded. The station served tens of thousands of soldiers based at what became nearby Fort Eustis during World War I and World War II.

Skiffe's Creek Reservoir

Skiffe's Creek Reservoir is a portion of the Newport News Waterworks, a regional water provider, owned and operated by the City of Newport News, that serves over 400,000 people in the cities of Hampton, Newport News, Poquoson, and portions of York County and James City County. The regional water system, which included initially an impingement of the Warwick River in western Warwick County, was begun as a project of

as part of the development of the lower peninsula with the

, the

s on the harbor of

, and massive shipyard which were the major sources of industrial growth which helped found Newport News as a new independent city in 1896.

19th-21st centuries

In the early 20th century, Skiffe's Creek was bridged by the new

U.S. Route 60 U.S. Route 60 is a major east–west United States highway, traveling from southwestern Arizona to the Atlantic Ocean coast in Virginia. The highway's eastern terminus is in Virginia Beach, Virginia, where it is known as Pacific Avenue, in the ...

. In modern times, most through traffic uses the nearby four-laned Interstate 64 or State Route 143. Two-laned Route 60 now primarily links local traffic between the Grove community of southeastern James City County and the Lee Hall community of Newport News, with each attempting to retain some of their rural aspects as their respective localities are more fully developed. A small portion of the expansive Naval Weapons Station Yorktown is in the Skiffe's Creek watershed. In the late 20th century, the larger-than-normal rural two story frame depot at Lee Hall was saved from demolition and is highly valued by rail fans and rail preservationists. In June 2007, a CSX hopper train derailed at the Skiffe's Creek Trestle, with no injuries.

References

External links

James City County Watersheds

Newport News Waterworks
{{authority control Rivers of James City County, Virginia Rivers of Virginia Tributaries of the James River Bodies of water of Newport News, Virginia

Early history 17th-19th centuries

Skiffe's Creek Reservoir

19th-21st centuries

See also

References

External links