Hogg Island
There is a certain charm and depth of interest about the long sand beaches and coast islands of the Eastern Shore of Virginia, but none equals Hog Island, or more properly Hogg Island, in this county in this respect.
In the early years of the settlement the big landed proprietors took up these coast islands. Col. Custis owned Smith's Island and it has descended from him to Miss Mary Custis Lee, the present owner. Proutt's [Island] and Cobb's Islands were owned by the Floyd family and formerly pastured hundreds of sheep and cattle, but are now a waste of sand dunes.
Hogg Island was at one time heavily timbered in pine and cedar and groves of sweet-scented myrtle, extending far to the seaward of the present time of timber. It was the resort of Capt. Kidd and of Blackbeard, and it is said that "Rum Hill" contained some of the stolen treasure of the latter pirate. The name was given the point because traders to and from the West Indies used to touch there and conceal rum in the sand till it could be gotten to the mainland.
The island was first known as "Shooting Bears Island," but later it got in possession of Captain Hogg or Hogue, a vessel owner of the early part of the 18th century, in Virginia, and took its name from him and it has been retained since, but with the spelling shortened.
The island is about 10 miles long and the inhabited portion about a mile wide. It has a long and wide stretch of sand dunes and beach. Its pine woods, though reduced in extent by the encroachments of the sand, are still beautiful, and these, together with its myrtle groves and cedar thickets form its distinctive features. In recent times the number of inhabitants has increased, and it now has some 300, mostly natives of the place. It has a Methodist church with a local minister, and around the church are some graves of former inhabitants. Not far away is the public school house, and near the center of the island, surrounded by the pines and myrtles, stand the new light-tower, over two hundred feet high. The view from the top is very beautiful, giving as it does the whole island and the beach for miles and the Broadwater with its marshes.
There is also a government wharf, a hotel and the present lifesaving station located at the south end.
The old light house and the keeper's residence, close at hand, are interesting relicts of the past. This tower erected about a hundred years ago and considered one of the best on the coast at the time.
The woodland walks, the long clean stretches of beach, and the constant moan of the surf render this a little land of enchantment indeed, that the spirit of commercialism has not yet changed.