The Virginia Peninsula was already engaged in wartime work when President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress to declare war against Germany on April 6, 1917. Local military bases, shipyards, air fields, ports, and people turned their faces toward the nation’s crusade to make the world safe for democracy.

Something unusual occurred in the early morning darkness of January 31, 1863, when the Confederate ironclad rams, CSS Chicora and CSS Palmetto State, crossed the Charleston Bar and struck the Union ships guarding that blockade runners’ haven.

After the ironclad’s showdown with CSS Virginia on March 9, 1862, USS Monitor was considered the ‘little ship that saved the nation.’

By mid-September 1918, the first cases of the Spanish Flu were reported, impacting the soldiers, sailors, and workers coming into the Hampton Roads community to support the war effort. Bases and ships had to be built, requiring more workers than Hampton Roads had ever seen before.

CSS Nashville played an important role in the Confederate search for European recognition.

The Civil War introduced many new technologies to achieve victory in a total war.

The Civil War’s second major amphibious operation was the capture of Port Royal Sound on November 7, 1861.

Major General John Bankhead Magruder arrived in Texas in late October 1862 and immediately sought to regain the laurels he had earned on the Virginia Peninsula.