The History of Lexington, SC
The town of Lexington is located approximately 15 miles west of Columbia in central South Carolina. Lexington has a rich history that goes back hundreds of years to South Carolina’s colonial days. The region of Lexington was once the Royal township of Saxe Gotha, which was established in 1735 by the Colonial government of King George II. Most of the area’s early settlers came from Germany and Switzerland, but many also came from Pennsylvania, Virginia, and other nearby territories. In 1785, after the culmination of the Revolutionary War, the region of Saxe Gotha became Lexington County, and thus the settlement itself became known as Lexington.
The county seat and courthouse was moved from Granby to Lexington in 1820. At first, Lexington was referred to as “Lexington Courthouse” because a courthouse and a handful of houses were the only buildings there. But as the years went by, Lexington grew in population and began cultivating an identity on its own. By 1861, Lexington was incorporated as a town, and its residents included doctors and lawyers, farmers, and people of various trades. The strength of this growing community would soon come into play, when during the Civil War the occupying Union Army burned a majority of Lexington’s businesses and homes to the ground. Rather than leaving Lexington, the residents banded together to rebuild. As a reward, the town saw tremendous growth and prosperity with the arrival of the Columbia-Augusta Railroad and the construction of the Lexington Textile Mill in 1890.
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