Nearly 30 years after colonial travelers, including a teenaged George Washington, pitched tents and took the waters in stone-lined pools, the Virginia Legislature in 1776 established the town of Bath on 50 acres around the warm mineral springs. This unprecedented act made it the first, and possibly the only, American town created specifically as a spa. Although the municipality's official name remains Bath, it is widely known as Berkeley Springs. Within the 18th-century town limits, the first lots sold in 1777 were bought by figures including George and Samuel Washington, three signers of the Declaration of Independence and Constitution, two Revolutionary War generals, and several members of the Continental Congress, showing that Bath was chosen by the colonial elite as a fashionable summer retreat. Its history has included alternating periods of notoriety and decline, with at least four golden ages as a premier resort and spa, beginning in the 1760s through the 1790s and continuing in the antebellum era, the Victorian period, and the present day. The town also suffered Civil War damage at the hands of Stonewall Jackson. In 2009, Bath's nearly 250-year history and more than 150 historic structures within its limits led to its designation as a National Historic District, with architecture ranging from Italianate Victorian to Gothic Revival to Queen Anne. The legislative act establishing Bath called for building convenient houses to accommodate infirm persons who visited the springs yearly in hopes of recovering their health.
