One Thomas Jarvis owned a tract of 200 acres of land on the west side of Hampton Creek, which in his will dated April 6, 1684, he devised to be sold for the payment of his debts, any residue to go to his wife Elizabeth and his son Thomas. He appointed his wife Elizabeth, George Richards and Edmund Foster executors. George Richards contracted to sell this land to William Wilson. The other executors refusing to fulfill the contract, Richards and Wilson brought suit against them and the infant Thomas Jarvis by Edward Mole, his guardian, before the Master of Rolls in England who ordered that the defendants join in a deed to William Wilson in consideration of £50 and in fulfillment of the contract of George Richards, one of the executors. In 1681, the Assembly passed an act decreeing that a town be built on "the west side of Hampton River on the land of Mr. William Wilson, lately belonging to one Thomas Jarvis, deceased, the plantation where he lived and the place appointed by a former law."
