Caswell County, North Carolina

Caswell County is a county in North Carolina, United States, about 35 miles southwest of
Greensboro and 14 miles south of Danville, Virginia. It had a population of 22,736 at the 2020
census, an estimated 22,563 by 2025, and covers 428.71 square miles (1,110.4 km2) centred near
36°23′N 79°20′W.

Yanceyville is the county seat and the county’s largest town; its postal code is 27379. The
county holds 2 incorporated towns and 10 unincorporated communities, and it runs on Eastern Time.
Its FIPS code is 37033.

Towns & Villages in Caswell County

Caswell County has 12 named places on record: 2 incorporated towns and 10 unincorporated
communities with no local government of their own. Unincorp. covers crossroads and rural
communities with no formal boundary.

Leasburg was Caswell County’s first incorporated town, chartered in 1788 around an early
courthouse site, but it later gave up its town government and is unincorporated today. Milton,
the county’s second and only other incorporated town, sits far to the east on the Dan River and
has never grown much past its early-1800s footprint.

ZIP Codes

• 27379 — Yanceyville
• 27311 — Pelham
• 27314 — Prospect Hill
• 27315 — Providence
• 27291 — Leasburg
• 27212 — Blanch
• 27305 — Milton

Semora, Casville, Cherry Grove, Camp Springs and Purley have no post office and no ZIP code of
their own; mail there is delivered under the nearest listed town’s code.

Geography

Caswell County sits in North Carolina’s north-central Piedmont, a belt of rolling hills between
the mountains and the coastal plain, running right up to the Virginia line. Of its 428.71 square
miles, 425.37 are land and 3.34 are water, under 1 percent — the county has no large natural
lake. The Dan River crosses the county’s northeast corner near Milton and forms part of the
boundary with Virginia’s Pittsylvania County, while Hyco Lake, a reservoir built for cooling water
at a power plant, draws boaters and anglers from the county’s east side.

Rockingham County lies to the west, Alamance County to the south, Orange County to the
southeast and Person County to the east. Pittsylvania County and Halifax County, both in Virginia,
border Caswell to the north. Rockingham
County, Alamance County, Orange County and Person County all have their own pages on
this site; the two Virginia counties do not.

Demographics

Caswell County had a population of 22,736 at the 2020 census, and the latest estimate puts the
county near 22,563 residents, a slight decline. Yanceyville, with 1,937 people, is by far the
county’s largest place; Milton, the only other incorporated town, has just 155. Median household
income runs $59,755 (2024 DataUSA estimate), well below North Carolina’s statewide figure of
$70,804 (2023 ACS). Population density works out to roughly 53 people per square mile of land,
low even for a rural Piedmont county, and the population has been essentially flat to slightly
falling for two decades as the tobacco economy that once supported far more farm families has
shrunk.

Economy & Local Life

Manufacturing employs the most workers in the county, about 1,566 people, followed by health
care and social assistance at 1,390 and retail trade at 1,212. Agriculture, once dominated by
flue-cured tobacco, has declined sharply but still shapes the county’s rural character. Riverside
Furniture Corporation opened a distribution center in the county in 2020, adding about 50 jobs,
and a Cherokee Tobacco processing facility announced in 2024 brought a further $14 million
investment and 39 jobs. Caswell County Schools and two state correctional facilities — the
Dan River Prison Work Farm and Caswell Correctional Center — are also major employers.
Piedmont Community College operates a branch campus in Yanceyville, open since 1988, and a
separate agribusiness training center in Pelham.

History

North Carolina’s General Assembly formed Caswell County on 1 June 1777, carving it out of
Orange County. It was named for Richard Caswell, North Carolina’s first state governor. Yanceyville,
originally called Caswell Court House, was renamed in 1833.

In 1781, during the run-up to the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, British General Lord
Cornwallis chased American General Nathanael Greene’s army through the county in what became known
as the Race to the Dan — Greene’s retreat drew Cornwallis far from his South Carolina supply
lines, weakening him ahead of the eventual British defeat at Yorktown. Cornwallis’s troops passed
through Camp Springs and Leasburg and on toward Red House Church near Semora.

In 1839, an enslaved man known as Stephen, working on Abisha Slade’s farm at Purley, discovered
the flue-curing process that produces bright leaf tobacco. Slade refined the method through the
1850s; by 1857 his farm was harvesting 20,000 pounds of bright leaf on 100 acres and selling it in
Lynchburg, Virginia, at prices far above ordinary tobacco. The technique spread to neighboring
farms and helped make North Carolina the country’s dominant tobacco-growing state for the next
century.

During Reconstruction, the county was the site of one of North Carolina’s most notorious
political killings. On 21 May 1870, Klansmen assassinated John W. Stephens, a Republican state
senator, inside the Yanceyville courthouse, stabbing and strangling him in a vacant courtroom after
the county sheriff — secretly a Klan member — lured him there. The killing went
uninvestigated for years and remains one of the best-documented Klan murders of the era.

Getting There

No interstate crosses Caswell County. US 158 runs east–west through Yanceyville, linking
Reidsville to Roxboro and Oxford, and NC 86 runs north–south through Yanceyville, connecting
Chapel Hill and Hillsborough to the Virginia line at Danville.

• Danville, Virginia — about 14 miles north
• Greensboro — about 35 miles southwest
• Burlington — about 22 miles south
• Roxboro — about 19 miles east

Piedmont Triad International Airport, near Greensboro, is the nearest major commercial
airport, roughly 40 miles from Yanceyville. The nearest Amtrak station is in Burlington, served by
the Carolinian and Piedmont trains toward Charlotte, Raleigh and New York.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where is Caswell County located?
It sits in North Carolina’s north-central Piedmont on the Virginia line, about 35 miles southwest
of Greensboro and 14 miles south of Danville, Virginia.

What is the population of Caswell County?
22,736 at the 2020 census, with an estimate near 22,563 by 2025.

How big is Caswell County?
428.71 square miles (1,110.4 km2), of which 425.37 square miles are land.

What is the county seat of Caswell County?
Yanceyville, renamed from Caswell Court House in 1833, is the county seat and largest town.

How many towns are in Caswell County?
Two incorporated towns — Yanceyville and Milton — plus ten unincorporated
communities: Pelham, Prospect Hill, Providence, Leasburg, Blanch, Semora, Casville, Cherry Grove,
Camp Springs and Purley.

What ZIP codes does Caswell County use?
27379 for Yanceyville, 27305 for Milton, and 27311, 27314, 27315, 27291 and 27212 for Pelham,
Prospect Hill, Providence, Leasburg and Blanch.

What is Caswell County known for?
The 1839 discovery of the bright leaf tobacco curing process on Abisha Slade’s farm at Purley,
and the 1870 Reconstruction-era assassination of state senator John W. Stephens in the Yanceyville
courthouse.

More counties in this state: Towns and villages in North Carolina.