The assemblage of buildings on and around Eastville’s court square includes the 1899 Northampton County courthouse by F. Bartholomew Smith, the 1731 courthouse and clerk’s office, and an early-19th-century debtors’ prison. The latter three buildings, maintained as museums by the Northampton County Branch of the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities (now Preservation Virginia), form an early court complex symbolic of the Eastern Shore’s long history. The 1731 courthouse, built by John Marshall, was moved to its present location in 1913 in order make room for a Confederate monument; the front wall was rebuilt in the process. The complex also includes a row of small attorneys’ offices and the ca. 1780 Eastville Inn, a rambling frame courthouse tavern with several additions. Eastville has been the county seat since 1690. The county has the nation’s oldest continuously kept English county records.  The Northampton County Courthouse Historic District forms the core of the Eastville Historic District.