Batesburg-Leesville is a town located in Lexington and Saluda counties, South Carolina, United States.

[7] The first mayor of Batesburg-Leesville was also the last mayor of Batesburg, Dr. Elza S. "Sandy" Spradley, Jr. Spradley had been a practicing pharmacist and business owner in the town, a town council member, a member of the Batesburg Water Commission, a founding member of the community’s rescue squad, and an 18-year Fire Chief on the Batesburg Fire Department, retiring after 33 years.

[9][10] In February 1946 a black World War II veteran, Sergeant Isaac Woodard, was removed from a Greyhound bus in Batesburg after an argument with the driver.

While still in uniform he was severely beaten by local police officers, including Sheriff Lynwood Shull, and permanently blinded.

Due to South Carolina's reluctance to pursue the case, President Harry S. Truman ordered a federal investigation.

This incident helped lead to Truman setting up the President's Committee on Civil Rights and issuing Executive Order 9981 desegregating the armed forces.

In early 2018, the town of Batesburg-Leesville, with Town Attorney Christian Spradley, Police Chief W. Wallace Oswald, and Mayor Lancer Shull (no relation to Linwood Shull [citation needed]), reopened the Woodard case to consider dismissing the 1946 charges.

During a regular term of municipal court on June 5, 2018, Woodard's "drunk and disorderly" case was reopened and the conviction was vacated by Town Judge Robert Cook.

[12] After a fundraising campaign,[13] a permanent historic plaque now stands on the corner of West Church Street and Fulmer Street in old Batesburg commemorating the civil rights incident at the site of the original police station.

[17] The Batesburg-Leesville Fire Department[18] consists of two stations, five career staff members and 41 volunteer firefighters as of September 2019.

The Panthers' colors are purple, gold, and blue The Batesburg-Leesville Primary School opened in 1984.

The original two-story wooden Hampton School (1922) was replaced in 1954 by a single-story brick structure on South Lee Street in Leesville.

The original wooden building was subsequently torn down, but a marker remains under a large tree in the parking lot of Friendship Baptist Church on South Lee Street.

In 2008, Midlands Technical College opened a new Batesburg-Leesville satellite campus in the Leesville Historic District.

In 2007, Lexington County Chronicle and The Dispatch-News began appearing at town stores and business to complement their subscribers in the area.

Historically, U.S. Route 1 followed this line, and it presently separates the north and south sides of the duel town.

Typically in this vicinity, the Piedmont area has a clay soil surface, while the Coastal Plain is sandy.

As of the 2020 United States census, there were 5,270 people, 2,046 households, and 1,458 families residing in the town.