Naval History and Heritage Command

A bay at Norfolk, Va., an estuary of Hampton Roads, named in 1608 by Capt. John Smith to honor both his birthplace and his close friend Lord Willoughby.

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The first Willoughby (SP-2129), a wooden-hulled ferry, was originally built in 1903 at Sou Rondout, N.Y., as Augustus J. Phillips. Chartered by the Navy from the Chesapeake Ferry Co. of Portsmouth, Va., for local district patrol duties in World War I, Willoughby was assigned the classification SP-2129 and commissioned on 8 February 1918. She operated in the 5th Naval District for the duration of World War I and was ultimately decommissioned and returned to her pre-war owners, the Chesapeake Ferry Co., on 26 September 1919.