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Virginia Counties

The Commonwealth of Virginia is divided into 95 counties and 39 independent cities, which are considered county-equivalents for census purposes.

Lancaster County, Virginia

Lancaster County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education

County Seat: Lancaster
Year Organized: 1651
Square Miles: 133

Court House:

8311 Mary Ball Road
County Courthouse
Lancaster, VA 22503-2519

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Lancaster is named for Lancaster, England.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

History

Lancaster County, Virginia formed from Northumberland and York Counties. [Virginia Counties: Those Resulting from Virginia Legislation, by Morgan Poitiaux Robinson, originally published as Bulletin of the Virginia State Library, Volume 9, January, April, July 1916, reprinted 1992 by Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., Baltimore, MD.]

Lancaster County was named for the English county. It was formed from York and Northumberland Counties in 1651. Its area is 136.5 square miles, and the county seat is Lancaster.

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 231 square miles (599 km²), of which, 133 square miles (345 km²) of it is land and 98 square miles (254 km²) of it (42.45%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

Essex County, VA to the west
Middlesex County, VA to the south
Northumberland County, VA to the north
Richmond County, VA to the northwest

Cities and Towns:

- Irvington	town	Incorporated Area
- Kilmarnock	town	Incorporated Area
- Lancaster (County Seat)
- White Stone	town	Incorporated Area

County Resources:

Enter County Resources and Information Here

County Resource Guide

Counties: US Map

The history of our nation can be seen as a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names we've given our counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of our country!"

But age, size and colorful names of our counties isn't the only reason to explore counties' role in American history, or the history of county government itself. In fact, the story of county government reflects the larger meanings of American history.

Today's counties are the most flexible, locally responsive and creative governments in the US. They are the most diverse, varying in size, population, geography, and governmental structure. In their politics and policies, they express a 1990's political slogan "Think globally, act locally."

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