Hampton traces its history to the city's Old Point Comfort, the home of Fort Monroe, which was named by the 1607 voyagers, led by Captain Christopher Newport, who first established Jamestown as an English colonial settlement.

The city features a wide array of business and industrial enterprises, retail and residential areas, historical sites, and other points of interest, such as a NASCAR short track, the oldest Anglican parish in the Americas (1610), and a moated, six-sided, historical bastion fort.

The Powhatan Chiefdom was made up of over 30 tribes numbering an estimated 25,000 people before the arrival of English colonists.

[9][10][11] In December 1606, three ships carrying men and boys left England on a mission sponsored by a proprietary company.

Weeks later, on May 14, 1607, they established the first permanent English settlement in the present-day United States about 25 miles (40 km) further inland from the Bay which became the site of fortifications during the following 200 years.

Slightly south, near the entrance to Hampton River, the colonists seized the Native American community of Kecoughtan under Virginia's Governor, Sir Thomas Gates.

(With Jamestown having been abandoned in 1699, Hampton claims to be the oldest continuously occupied English settlement in the United States.

In the latter part of August 1619, the White Lion, a privateer captained by John Colyn Jope and sailing under a Dutch letter of marque, delivered approximately 20 enslaved Africans, from the present-day region of Angola to Point Comfort.

[13][14] John Rolfe, the widower of Pocahontas, wrote in a letter that he was at Point Comfort and witnessed the arrival of the first Africans.

[15] Shortly after the war ended, the US Army built a more substantial stone facility at Old Point Comfort.

[16] Fort Monroe, Hampton and the surrounding area played several important roles during the American Civil War (1861–1865).

Although most of Virginia became part of the Confederate States of America, Fort Monroe remained in Union hands.

It became notable as a historic and symbolic site of early freedom for former slaves under the provisions of contraband policies and later the Emancipation Proclamation.

After the War, former Confederate President, Jefferson Davis was imprisoned in the area now known as the Casemate Museum on the base.

From the ruins of Hampton left by evacuating Confederates in 1861, "Contraband" slaves (formerly owned by Confederates and under a degree of Union protection) built the Grand Contraband Camp, the first self-contained African American community in the United States.

The large number of contraband slaves who sought the refuge of Fort Monroe and the Grand Contraband Camp led to educational efforts which eventually included establishment of Hampton University, site of the famous Emancipation Oak.

Hampton has been a center of military aviation training, research and development for nearly a hundred years, from early prop planes and Zeppelins to rocket parts and advanced fighters.

Thousands of Navy families associated with Naval bases in Norfolk next door also waited in Hampton during this era.

There accumulated over time, in the Hampton area, a high concentration of families of unaccounted for wartime casualties.

Hampton has a humid subtropical climate (Köppen: Cfa)[24] characteristic of the Southeast United States.

The Hampton Coliseum, a multi-purpose arena built in 1968, serves as a major venue for entertainment acts such as Monster Jam and WWE wrestling, musical concerts from artists such as Bruce Springsteen, The Rolling Stones, The Grateful Dead and Phish and various regional sports games from the area.

Virginia Wesleyan College and Christopher Newport University also provide sports at the NCAA Division III level.

In Virginia Beach, the Hampton Roads Piranhas field men's and women's professional soccer teams.

The city is fortunate to have a good network of local streets and bridges to cross the various rivers and creeks.

Likewise, Williamsburg, Yorktown and the counties of James City and York are also located nearby in the Peninsula sub-region, and many roads lead to them.

To reach most of its other neighbors in the South Hampton Roads sub-region, it is necessary to cross the harbor and/or the mouth of the James River.

The third crossing option is the James River Bridge, also in Newport News, which connects to Isle of Wight County and the town of Smithfield.

The Hampton Transit Center, located close to the downtown area at the intersection of West Pembroke Avenue and King Street, offers a hub for local and intercity public transportation.

Hampton is served by several Amtrak trains a day, with direct service from Newport News station in nearby Newport News (on Warwick Boulevard just west of Mercury Boulevard) through Williamsburg and Richmond to points along the Northeast Corridor from Washington DC through Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City all the way to Boston.

[75] The larger Norfolk International Airport (often known locally by its code letters "ORF") also serves the region.