Founded in 1737 at the furthest navigable point on the James River, RICHMOND remained a small outpost until just before the end of the colonial era, when independence-minded Virginians, realizing that their capital at Williamsburg was open to British attack, shifted it fifty miles further inland. The move to Richmond failed to offer much protection - the city was raided many times and twice put to the torch, once by troops under the command of Benedict Arnold.

Richmond subsequently flourished, its population reaching 100,000 by the time of the Civil War. When war broke out it was named the capital of the Confederacy , despite the fact that Virginia had voted two-to-one against secession from the Union just a month before. The massive Tredegar Iron Works , now a dedicated visitor center-cum-museum, became the main engine of the Confederate war machine. For four years the city was the focus of Southern defenses and Union attacks, but despite an almost constant state of siege - General McClellan came within six miles as early as 1862, and General Grant steamrolled remorselessly towards it through the last months of the war - it held on until the very end. It was less than a week after the fall of Richmond, on April 3, 1865, that General Lee surrendered to General Grant at Appomattox, a hundred miles west.

After the war, Richmond was devastated. Much of its downtown was burned, allegedly by fleeing Confederates who wanted to keep its stores of weapons, and its warehouses full of tobacco, out of the victors' hands. Rebuilding, however, was quick, and the city's economy has remained among the strongest in the South. Today's Richmond is a remarkably elegant city, with an extensive inventory of architecturally significant older buildings alongside its modern office towers. Tobacco is still a major industry - machine-rolled cigarettes were invented here in the 1870s, and Marlboro-maker Phillip Morris runs a huge manufacturing plant just south of downtown. Richmond is also a leading banking center.