Wilmington is a neighborhood in the South Bay and Harbor region of Los Angeles, California,[2] covering 9.14 square miles (23.7 km2).

Featuring a heavy concentration of industry and the third-largest oil field in the continental United States, this neighborhood has a high percentage of Latino and foreign-born residents.

[3] During the COVID-19 pandemic, Wilmington had one of the highest death rates in all of Los Angeles County, exacerbated by elevated levels of industrial pollution.

Places of interest include the headquarters U.S. Army for Southern California and the Drum Barracks built to protect the nascent Los Angeles harbor during the American Civil War.

Wilmington shares borders with Carson to the north, Long Beach to the east, San Pedro to the south and west and Harbor City to the northwest.

Mexico and Guatemala were the most common places of birth for the 44.5% of the residents who were born abroad, considered a high percentage of foreign-born when compared with the city and the county as a whole.

[9] The Spanish Empire expanded into this area when the Viceroy of New Spain commissioned Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo to explore the Pacific Ocean in 1542–1543.

[10] Phineas Banning acquired the land that would become Wilmington from Manuel Dominguez, grand nephew and heir to Juan José Domínguez, in 1858 to build a harbor for the city of Los Angeles.

[11]: 7 [1] In 1861, at the beginning of the Civil War, Banning and Benjamin Wilson gave the federal government 60 acres of land to build Drum Barracks to protect the nascent Los Angeles harbor from Confederate attack.

Los Angeles annexed Wilmington in 1909,[15] and today it and neighboring San Pedro form the waterfront of one of the world's largest import/export centers.

[17] During World War II the United States Military operated the Los Angeles Port of Embarkation in Wilmington, from which soldiers and sailors were sent abroad to battle zones.