Template:Wp-Botetourt County, Virginia-History

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First proposed in the House of Burgesses in 1767, Botetourt County was created in 1770 from Augusta County. The county is named for Norborne Berkeley, Baron de Botetourt, more commonly known as Lord Botetourt (1718–1770), who was a popular governor of the Virginia Colony from 1768 to 1770, when he died suddenly while in office.

In 1772, the county was reduced to the area east of the New and Kanawha rivers by the creation of Fincastle County. Most of that latter county became the Commonwealth of Kentucky in 1792.^[1] The other counties established directly from portions of Botetourt County are: Rockbridge (1778), Bath (1791), Alleghany (1822), Roanoke (1833), and Craig (1851).