troops embarked in transports that night. The next morning they landed near the site selected by the President. The latter, still afloat, from his "command ship" Miami ordered the Monitor to reconnoiter Sewells Point to learn if the batteries were still manned. When he found the works abandoned, President Lincoln ordered Major General Wool's troops to march on Norfolk, where they arrived late on the afternoon of the 10th. On May 10, 1862, Norfolk Navy Yard was set afire before being evacuated by Confederate forces in a general withdrawal up the peninsula to defend Richmond. Union troops crossed Hampton Roads from Fort Monroe, landed at Ocean View, and captured Norfolk. With the entire area back under Union control, the isolated batteries at Sewells Point lost their importance and were abandoned. For the remainder of the 19th century, the area was largely undeveloped and sparsely populated. Sewells Point in the 20th century Early in the 20th century, two developments at Sewells Point would have a long-lasting effect on its role in US history. Each laid the groundwork for founding of what was to become the world's largest naval base. The first could be described as a civilian battle, one of competition, between the growing railroad and industrial powers. The other had its beginning as a civilian celebration. These were the building of the Virginian Railway and the Jamestown Exposition. Building the Virginian Railway In the mid-1890s, William N. Page, a civil engineer who had previously worked building the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O) had a dream. He knew of rich untapped bituminous coal fields lying between the New River Valley and the lower Guyandotte River in southern West Virginia in an area not yet reached by the C&O and its major competitor, the Norfolk and Western Railway (N&W). While the bigger railroads which were busy developing nearby areas and shipping coal via rail to Hampton Roads, he formed a plan. To take advantage of the undeveloped coal lands, Page enlisted several friends as investors to help purchase the land. In 1898, he acquired a small logging railroad, and converted and expanded it to become the intrastate (within West Virginia only) Deepwater Railway. The new short-line railroad planned to connect with the existing lines of the C&O along the Kanawha River at Deepwater and the N&W at Matoaka. As Page developed his Deepwater Railway, he ran into a wall in negotiating to