, namesake of Warren County. Portrait by
John Singleton Copley, When counties were established in the
Province of New York in 1683, the present Warren County was part of
Albany County. The county was enormous, covering the northern part of New York State, all of the present State of
Vermont, and, in theory, extended westward to the Pacific Ocean. It was reduced in size on July 3, 1766, by the creation of
Cumberland County, and further on March 16, 1770, by the creation of
Gloucester County, both containing territory now in Vermont. On March 12, 1772, what was left of Albany County was split into three parts, one remaining under the name Albany County. One of the other pieces,
Charlotte County (named for the British queen
Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz), contained the eastern portion. In 1778, the name Charlotte County was changed to
Washington County to honor
George Washington, the
American Revolutionary War general and later
President of the United States of America. In 1788, Washington County was reduced in size by the splitting-off of
Clinton County. This was a much larger area than the present Clinton County, including several other counties or county parts of the present New York State. Washington County was slightly enlarged by the transfer of the
Town of Cambridge from Albany County to Washington County in 1791. In 1813, Warren County was split off from Washington County, receiving its name in honor of General
Joseph Warren. County officials first met in the Lake George Coffee House in the
hamlet of Caldwell (known today as
Lake George Village). James Caldwell, a patenee of the
Town of Caldwell, donated land within the hamlet to serve as the county seat beginning in 1819.
Lake George is the site of a YMCA conference center, the Silver Bay YMCA, founded in 1900 and one of only a few of its type in the United States. The
Silver Bay Inn was built in 1904 and is on the
National Register of Historic Places. In 1963, the courthouse in Lake George village was closed and operations moved several miles south to its present-day location at the Warren County Municipal Center main campus in Queensbury. ==Geography==