James River

James River is formed by the union of the Jackson and Cowpasture streams in the west of Virginia, and has its entire course in that state. It flows in a generally east-south-east direction, passing Lynchburgh and Richmond; and, widening into an estuary for the last 60 miles of its course, it falls into the Atlantic at the southern extremity of Chesapeake Bay. It is 450 miles in length, and is navigable for large steamers to City Point, at the mouth of the Appomattox. It was at Jamestown, now a ruined village on the north bank of this river, that the first English settlement in America was formed (1607). The James River and Kanawha Canal, which extends from Richmond to the White Sulphur Springs, follows the windings of the river for a considerable distance.