In 1888 the forerunner to Norfolk General, the 25-bed Retreat for the Sick, was opened in downtown Norfolk.[6] At this time there were fewer than 200 hospitals in the entire country. In 1892 the Retreat for the Sick opened the first nursing school in Norfolk. The hospital moved to a new location in 1896 and was renamed Norfolk Protestant Hospital in 1898. The hospital moved again in 1903 and witnessed a fire in 1906, though there were no deaths. Norfolk Protestant was renamed Norfolk General in the 1930s and the first open-heart surgery in Virginia was performed there in 1967.
After medical school at Harvard Medical School and training in general surgery and critical care, Suffolk native, Dr. L.D. Britt returned to Hampton Roads and built a well–respected general surgery program and established Norfolk General Hospital as Hampton Roads' only Level 1 trauma center.