Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 10.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

[500] and censor, and in that year he formulated and sent to England a list of charges, separately numbered, not only against the natural condition of the country in some respects, but against the public administration of the affairs of the Colony.

A portion of his sixth charge is as follows: “I found not ye least peec of Fortification; Three peeces of ordinance onely [only], mounted at James Citty, and one at Flowerdue Hundred, but never a one of them serviceable,” &c.

In their reply to another charge, in which Butler had spoken of “bogges” in the country--“Divers planters that have long lived in Virgirnia, as alsoe sundry marriners and other persons y't have been often at Virginia” --say: “As for Bogges, we knowe of none in all ye country, and for the rest of ye Plantacons, as Newport's News, Blunt Poynt,” &c..

In their special reply to Butler's sixth charge, the planters say, among other things: “As for great ordinance, there are fower pieces mounted at James City, and * * * * there are likewise at Newporte Newes three. * * * *.”

As to the mode of spelling the name by some of the private individuals,.residing at that period in the colony, I now cite Mr. Deane, the recording secretary mentioned in the earlier pages of this paper. In a foot-note to Mr. Grigsby's letter to himself, Mr. Deane says, that Newport News is “mentioned in a letter from Virginia under date of February, 1622, 1623.” And Mr. D. adds, “Another letter of April 8th of that year, (the same which speaks of the death of Captain Nuse, referred to in a note further on,) is dated from ‘Newport News.’ ” That the writer of the last mentioned letter did not use the last word (News) of the compound name as a form of spelling the surname of Sir William or of Captain Thomas Neuse, we know when we find him adverting to Captain Nuse's death in that very letter. This shows conclusively that he understood the name of the point was compounded of Newport's surname, and of the common noun “news.”

Where, in the few instances in private letters of those early days, the first word of the name is written in the nominative case, while all the public official letters present the word in the possessive case, we have in this last mentioned fact, the best of grounds for believing that the writers of those few private letters were careless as to affixing the sign of the possessive case, or the type-setters omitted the sign through inattention; for while Newport News is a senseless collocation of words signifying nothing, the combination Newport's News would have some meaning, like the two first words in the title “Smith's ”