Phoebus (known as Chesapeake City from 1871-1899) is a formerly incorporated town located in Elizabeth City County on the Virginia Peninsula in eastern Virginia. Upon incorporation in 1900, it was named in honor of local businessman Harrison Phoebus (1840–1886), who is credited with convincing the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O) to extend its tracks to the town from Newport News. The town was consolidated by a slim margin during a 1952 public referendum with the independent city of Hampton. Phoebus is now an important historic neighborhood of Hampton and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. History Captain John Smith landed on a part of Phoebus known as Strawberry Banks on his first voyage up the James River in 1607. The area which became the Town of Phoebus was founded in 1609 as Mill Creek; it was located on the banks of the Chesapeake Bay and Hampton Roads, directly across from Norfolk's Willoughby Spit. Mill Creek was located in Elizabeth Cittie [sic], one of four corporations, termed "citties" [sic], which were designated in 1619 by the Virginia Company of London, proprietor of the colony, to encompass the developed areas. (The other three were James Cittie, Charles Cittie, and Henrico Cittie). In 1634, the area became part of Elizabeth City Shire, one of the eight original shires of Virginia. It became Elizabeth City County in 1643. English colonists soon built defensive fortifications at Old Point Comfort to protect the entrance to Hampton Roads. In 1819 the United States Army began construction there of Fort Monroe, which until 2011 was the oldest active-duty fort in the nation. During the American Civil War, numerous slaves escaped to Fort Monroe and Norfolk, which was occupied by Union forces from 1861. The US Army defined them as contraband, to prevent their being returned to slaveholders. They established facilities for the newly free slaves at the Fort Monroe Contraband Camp, located outside the fort. Officials contacted a respected local teacher, Mary S. Peake, and asked her to teach the freedmen and their children. She began by gathering people outside in Phoebus, under a large oak tree. This is where the Emancipation Proclamation was read to numerous citizens in 1863, and it became called the Emancipation Oak. The American Missionary Association (AMA), whose leaders included both black and white ministers, hired her to teach and arranged for her to use the Brown Cottage. This is