SIZE AND CHARACTER
Spotsylvania County’s 407 square miles are still largely rural, but suburbia is spreading outward from the Fredericksburg city line. Spotsylvania is one of Virginia’s fastest-growing counties, largely because of its location along Interstate 95, midway between metropolitan Washington and Richmond.
Population:
2006 Census estimate: 119,529
2000 Census: 90,395
HISTORY
Spotsylvania’s roots extend back to 1721, when the colony of Virginia created a vast new county that stretched past the Blue Ridge Mountains. The county was named for Alexander Spotswood, lieutenant governor of the colony from 1710 to 1720.
The city of Fredericksburg was formed from the county in 1728. Spotsylvania’s many historic places include the sites of a skirmish near the Rappahannock River between American Indians and a group led by Capt. John Smith; the first commercially successful ironworks in North America; a slave revolt attempted in the 1810s; and one of the nation’s most productive pre-1849 gold mines.
The county is probably best-known for the battles fought on its soil during the Civil War. Because of Spotsylvania’s strategic location between the Confederate and Union armies, several major battles were fought in the county, including ones at Chancellorsville, Wilderness and Spotsylvania Court House, one of the bloodiest battles of the war. More than 100,000 troops from both sides died in Spotsylvania.
