Adam Thorowgood was baptized in 1603 at St. Botolph's Church in Grimston, Norfolk, England where his father was vicar. He arrived in Virginia on the Charles in 1621, and at the time of the muster in 1625 was living in Elizabeth City. By December 1626 when he had acquired 150 acres north of Hampton Roads, he was being referred to as Captain Adam Thorowgood, Gentleman, of Kecoughtan. Shortly thereafter he returned to England where he was married at St. Anne's Church, Blackfriars, London in July 1627 to Sarah Offley.

By March 1629 he was back and had been appointed commissioner for holding monthly court in Elizabeth City. He was a burgess in 1629, then for the lower part of Elizabeth City in 1630 to 1632, and finally was named to the council in 1637 and 1638. He is also visible in the record as sending four of his men to help settlers plant corn at Chiskayacke (Yorktown) when that area was opened for settlement, and as patenting 400 acres in Elizabeth City County in 1635.
           In June 1635 he received a patent for 5350 acres of land at Lynnhaven, for himself,

his wife and 105 persons he had brought into the colony since his marriage. The awarding of this patent received special encouragement in a 1634 letter from the Privy Council to Virginia's governor and council recommending that for his special services to the colony he receive a grant of land on the "Chesapeakean River to the southward of the Bays." With the acquisition of this land he moved from north of Hampton Roads to Lynnhaven. When this area became Lower Norfolk County in 1637 he was a member of the county's first court and was an early vestryman of Lynnhaven Parish.