For many years it was the largest peanut market in the world, but the company Besslose Marshland made little progress in draining the marsh and digging ditches, even with slave labor, was difficult. However, there was an attempt to arrest seven people who were severely discriminated against as runaway slaves and mulattos for trying to mix with the rest of the colonial population. The train was travelling through Suffolk, which was in the middle of a swampy area not far from the town of Norfolk, Virginia.

The Nansemond River offered timber, but shipping from Albemarle and Pamlico Sound was difficult because of the barrier islands, and the transport of goods through the Suffolk marshes remained difficult after the Revolutionary War. The trade with Suffolk came from North Carolina because it took place in the Chesapeake Bay. Shipping was delayed for months because ships could not dock in Suffolk to collect full cargoes of pig heads for transatlantic voyages.

After the Norfolk and St. Petersburg railroads were finally built, the Civil War broke out in 1861, and the Confederates abandoned southeastern Virginia to prepare for a march that ended at Gettysburg. The threat to Suffolk from the Confederate States of America and their allies was too great for them, so that the Battle of Fredericksburg, one of the most important battles of the war, took place later.

In the summer of 2013, city officials expected the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) and Joint Special Operations Command (JFCOM) to occupy the buildings cleared by J FCOM. The building that was to be vacated, known as the Joint Staff J7 Directorate, remained intact, and by the summer of 2013, city officials expected the US Army, USAC, Virginia State Police, and other law enforcement agencies to occupy it.

Gov. Timothy Kaine declared a state of emergency and ordered state agencies to help with the clean-up and recovery. Police and firefighters from Hampton Roads were sent to Suffolk to help with quarantine and clean-up work in the damaged area. The Virginia General Assembly passed the Public-Private Transportation Act in June 2013, which allows private companies to propose, build, operate, and fund transportation improvements.

The control stations would also carry out quality controls, restrict exports of tobacco from waste products, and impose higher costs - effective ways of collecting export taxes. Traders expected prices for Virginia growers to rise if the inspections ensured high-quality tobacco exports. Small farmers on large plantations, including workers who had acquired land to meet their conditions of detention, might grow one pig's head of tobacco a year. Farmers with limited acreage would transport their tobacco to the large plantation jetties via small ships with sloops; there are dozens of such jetties in the tidal waters. The low-density settlement pattern changed with the creation of cities, but it provided an opportunity for more efficient means of transportation and a more cost-effective way to collect export taxes.

During the Civil War, timber was harvested in Suffolk that was easy to harvest because cargoes of bare cypress and Atlantic white cedar flew down Shingle Creek to the quay in Suffolk. The logs were transported to the mills by railways across Suffolk, including the Norfolk and Virginia Railroad, Virginia and Southern Railway, and Richmond and Norfolk Railroad.

Other major employers in the city of Suffolk were Norfolk and Virginia Railroad, Virginia and Southern Railway and Lockhees Tobacco Company. In 1864, the first training camp of the US Army Corps of Engineers took place in Virginia.

The programme includes many activities and events in the city, including a variety of special events such as concerts, festivals, special events and other events in the city of Suffolk. Suffolk residents can also watch WSKY, which is broadcast on Channel 4, and Suffolk is home to the only public television station in the Hampton Roads area to have a tower in its vicinity, as well as a radio station.

Next to Suffolk is Smithfield, where a municipal facility called Nike Park is integrated into the city's public parks and recreational areas, as well as Virginia State Park. There is a circular highway connecting the seven largest cities in Hampton Roads. The state maintains roads in most counties and cities as part of Virginia's secondary highway system created by the Byrd Road Act of 1932.

The General Assembly made an exception when the former Nansemond County became an independent city (merged with Suffolk) in 1970, but it was to remain as the seat of Nansemond County until 1972, when it became the independent city of Suffolk. The former county was reunited in 1973 and then independent again in 1972, until it was merged into Suffolk in 1974.

At the 2010 census, 585,17,718 families lived in the city, 55.1% of which were married couples living together. 36.6% had children under 18 living with them, 23.9% of them were non-family, 16.8% had a housekeeper without husband, 2.5% had a male household, 1.2% had no female household, 0.7% had a single parent household and 1% were married.