Mathews County, Virginia

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

County Seat: Mathews
Year Organized: 1791
Square Miles: 86

Court House:

P.O. Box 839
County Courthouse
Mathews, VA 23109-0839

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Mathews is named for Virginia state legislator Thomas Mathews.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

History

Mathews County, Virginia formed from Gloucester County. Legislative enactment in 1790. Organized in 1791. [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.]

Mathews County was named for Thomas Mathews, of Norfolk, the Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates in 1790 when the county was formed from Gloucester County. Its area is 86 square miles, and the county seat is Mathews.

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 252 square miles (653 km²), of which, 86 square miles (222 km²) of it is land and 166 square miles (431 km²) of it (65.99%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

Gloucester County, VA to the west
Middlesex County, VA to the north

Cities and Towns:

- Mathews (County Seat)

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."

Penn Foster High School

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