The area around Suffolk, Virginia, which is now an independent city in the Hampton Roads region in the southeastern part of the state, was originally inhabited by Native Americans. At the time of European contact, the Nansemond people lived along the river later known by the same name. The area was first explored by Jamestown colonists led by explorer John Smith soon after the settlements founding in 1607, seeking means to survive the inhospitable environment at Jamestown Island. Settlement by the Nansemond By at least 1584, the Nansemond tribe originally lived in four villages along the Nansemond River, centered near Chuckatuck (now part of the city of Suffolk). Their head chief lived near Dumpling Island where the tribe’s temples and sacred items were located. At that time the tribe had a population of 1,200 persons with 300 bowmen. In 1608, the explorer John Smith and other colonists from Jamestown began to explore the Nansemond River, following the river's oyster beds; upon discovering a Nansemond settlement, Smith and his party raided it, worsening tensions between the two groups. The next year, a Nansemond raiding party routed another expeditionary party led by Smith, who ransacked the tribe's temple in revenge. Despite such tensions, the fledgling colony soon began to expand, and soon settlers gained control of the area as they drove out the Nansemond— the tribe lost their last known reservation lands in 1792. Early colonial settlement through the American Revolution The area in 1634 was originally a part of Elizabeth River Shire and then, in 1637, it became a part of Upper Norfolk County, which eventually in 1646 became Nansemond County. In the 1720s, John Constant settled along the Nansemond river (in what is now Suffolk) and built a home, wharf, and warehouse. Thus the site became known as "Constant's Warehouse." Under the Tobacco Inspection Act of 1730, one of the 40 tobacco inspection warehouses was chartered : " At the widow Constance's[sic], at Sleepy-Hole Point, in Nansemond County, under one inspection. " In 1742, the House of Burgesses, authorized a new town at Constant's Wharf, and named it "Suffolk" after Royal Governor Sir William Gooch's home county of Suffolk in East Anglia. In 1750, the county seat of Nansemond County was moved from Jarnigan's or Cohoon's Bridge to Suffolk. Eventually, enslaved Africans were imported to work on ships and as artisans in the town, but especially as laborers on tobacco