She was one of 13 frigates authorized by the Continental Congress on 13 December 1775, laid down in 1776 at Fells Point, Maryland, by George Wells, launched that August, and commissioned in the spring of 1777, Captain James Nicholson in command. Virginia herself was soon repaired and eventually purchased by the Royal Navy for use as the 32-gun frigate HMS Virginia. She was placed in service along the American coast and participated in the Penobscot Expedition of 1779 and the capture of Charleston, South Carolina, in 1780. At the end of the war she was condemned and sold.