The DelMarVa Peninsula
The Delmarva Peninsula occupies portions of three states. It’s named is formed from letters from Delaware, Maryland and Virginia.
The Fall Line, the line that separates the crystalline rocks of the Piedmont from the unconsolidated sediments of the Coastal Plain passes through the cities of Newark and Wilmington. This Fall Line is the actual border of the Delmarva Peninsula, but for many the northern border of Delmarva is the Chesapeake & Delaware (C&D) Canal.
This would technically make the region not a peninsula but an Island, since you can’t get on or off without crossing a body of water. However it’s still regarded as a peninsula since the canal is man-made.
The oldest English settlements of the area were settled as part of the Virginia Colony. In 1631 the Colony of Maryland was chartered to Cæcilius Calvert giving him the rights to lands North of the Potomac River and east of the Chesapeake Bay to the Delaware River and Bay. This was followed in 1681 when William Penn was given a Charter for Pennsylvania that included the land area now known as Delaware.
For the the first 150 years of English settlement the peninsula borders were questioned, Maryland felt that the entire peninsula should be part of the Maryland Colony and not fell under the control of three colonies. The borders were finally established by the Surveyors Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon in 1767.
Surprisingly for a short period time the peninsula was part of Calvert’s Charter. The original charter included all of the peninsula, but under the protest of Virginia, who made claims of settlement on the lower peninsula, it was change to be any lands not already settled.
Near Cape Henlopen, near present day Lewes, Delaware, the Dutch began a colony in 1631. The settlers were all killed by natives, but this took away the rights of Calvert to call the shores of the Delaware Bay as his. A few years later the Swedes established a settlement near present day New Castle, Delaware. This settlement fell to the Dutch and then to the English.
When William Penn was granted the Pennsylvania Colony, he request and received as part of his land half of the peninsula north of the Cape Henlopen. In 1704 Pennsylvania allowed the Three Lower Counties to self govern although the two had a common Royal Governor.
Calling the peninsula Delmarva is a recent development and didn’t become common until after World War I. The first use of Delmarva for commercial purposes serving as business names of companies that served all three states. The most common used name was the Chesapeake Peninsula or the Chesapeake Delaware Peninsula.
As far back as the mid 1600’s a canal across the peninsula between the Delaware River and the Chesapeake Bay was discussed. Augustine Herman was the first to proposed a canal. Herman was a mapmaker and developed one of the first maps of the upper Delmarva for the Calvert’s of Maryland. It wasn’t until the late 18th century that surveys of possible water routes were made. Even Benjamin Franklin was part of a group looking into a canal possibility.
In 1802 the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal Company was incorporated. Construction would begin in 1814, but due to lack of funds the project was halted in 1816. In 1822 the canal company reorganized and with monetary support from Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware and the Federal Government work began again in April 1824. It was open for business in 1829 at a cost of near 2.5 million dollars.
The canal of 1829 is much different than it is today. Then it was 14 miles long, 10 feet deep, 66 feet wide at the water line and 36 feet at the bottom. Locks existed at Delaware City and St. Georges Delaware as well as two at Chesapeake City Maryland.
In 1919, the Federal Government purchased the canal. In the six years from 1921 to 1927 the Army Corps of Engineers converted it to a sea-level canal, widened it, and removed all the locks. Today the canal is 450 feet wide with a depth of 35 feet. The canal is a modern sea-level commercial waterway that carries about 40 percent of the ship traffic to the Port of Baltimore.
From the C&D canal to the peninsula’s southern point at the tip of the Eastern Shore of Virginia it’s about 180 miles. At it’s widest it’s about 60 miles, although most of the peninsula is much narrower. The land area is about 5.45 million square miles.
The other bodies of waters surrounding the peninsula are to the East, Delaware Bay, Delaware River, Atlantic Ocean; to the West, The Chesapeake Bay and to the South the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay as it flows into the Atlantic Ocean.
The western or Chesapeake Bay coast is indented and marshy. Most of its western coast is Maryland’s Eastern Shore. The rest is the Virginia Eastern Shore west coast. The eastern coast is more regular with sandy beaches, especially along the Atlantic Ocean.
There are 5 bridges over the C&D canal to get onto the peninsula. These are at MD 213, Delaware 896, US 13, Delaware 1 and Delaware 9. There is also a railroad bridge that crosses the canal east of Delaware 896.
There are also two accesses to the peninsula across the Chesapeake Bay. One is the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, which crosses the bay near Annapolis Maryland to Kent Island. The other is the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel, which, links Cape Charles, Va., the southern tip of the peninsula, with Norfolk, VA.
Prior to the opening of Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay Bridge, officially called the William Preston Lane, Jr., Memorial Bridge in 1952, the only route across the Chesapeake Bay was through ferries. A parallel structure with three lanes was opened in 1973. These lanes are used for west bound traffic while the original 2 lane span is used for those east bound.
The shore–to-shore length of 4.3 miles makes it a long scenic over-water structure. Since 1975, typically on an early Sunday in May, the east bound span is closed to traffic for use by walkers for a scenic view of the bridge and bay. Although at times the walk has been cancelled due to weather conditions and once for security reasons.
Across the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay where it meets the Atlantic Ocean there is The Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel, officially the Lucius J. Kellam, Jr. Bridge-Tunnel. Its shore-to-shore distance is 17.6 miles and connects the Virginia town of Cape Charles with the city of Norfolk.
It opened in 1964, and consists of more than 12 miles of low trestle bridges, two suspension bridges and two tunnels, each a mile long under the shipping channels. It is considered the largest bridge-tunnel complex in the world.
The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the United States with more than 150 rivers and streams flowing into it. The name Chesapeake comes from the Algonquian word Chesepiooc, which is thought to mean “Great Shellfish Bay” or “Great Water. A recent scientific discovery theorizes that the bay was created by a meteor that hit the earth about 35.5 million years ago.
The Delaware Bay and the State was named by Samuel Argall of Virginia, who explored the area in 1610. He named the Bay after the Virginia’s Royal Governor Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr.
Nine of Maryland’s 23 counties are located on the peninsula. These being the counties of Kent, Queen Anne’s, Talbot, Caroline, Dorchester, Wicomico, Somerset, Worcester and a portion of Cecil County. The Virginia counties of Accomack and Northampton and the Delaware Counties of Kent, Sussex and a portion of New Castle County makes up the rest.
The 2000 census gives the total population residing in this area as 681,030 inhabitants.
A major part of the Delmarva Peninsula’s economy is through agriculture, aquaculture, sports hunting and fishing, and tourism.
© 2007-2009 Steven G. Atkinson – All Rights Reserved – ShoreToBeFun.com
This is a 2009 revision of the original article written in 2007
