Norfolk Committee of Safety Takes Control

Norfolk's Committee of Safety assumed effective governance of the town as royal authority collapsed in the summer of 1775. The committee enforced non-importation agreements, monitored Loyalist activity, and organized militia defense. Its task was complicated by Norfolk's deeply divided population, where many prominent merchants maintained Loyalist sympathies.

The committee's work reflected the ugly side of revolutionary governance: neighbors informing on neighbors, property seized from suspected Loyalists, social and economic pressure applied to those who would not commit to the patriot cause. Norfolk's division between patriots and Loyalists was sharper than in most Virginia towns, and the committee's authority was exercised in an atmosphere of suspicion and recrimination.