History of Washington D.C.
The history of Richmond, Virginia, as a modern city, dates to the early 17th century, and is crucial to the development of the colony of Virginia, the American Revolutionary War, and the Civil War. After Reconstruction, Richmond's location at the falls of the James River helped it develop a diversified economy and become a land transportation hub.
Civil War History
In February 1861, Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as President of the Confederate States of America in Montgomery, Alabama. Two months after Davis' inauguration, the Confederate army fired on Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, and the Civil War had begun. With the outbreak of war, followed by Virginia's secession in May 1861, the strategic location of the Tredegar Iron Works was one of the primary factors in the decision to relocate the capital of the Confederacy to Richmond. From this arsenal came much of the Confederates' heavy ordnance machinery, making 723 tons of armor plating that covered the CSS Virginia, the world's first ironclad used in the two-day Battle of Hampton Roads in March 1862, against the USS Monitor.
